Frontpage is showing something "editorial" as contrived as someone holding up a sign for Michael Jackson.  And other images that are no doubt less newsworthy than many that editors used to call news unworthy.
Crowds standing around, is not newsworthy. Picture of me holding up a sign for michael jackson, can be done outside my house even if it has nothing to do with me being outside Michael Jackson's wake,etc...
How can DT justify this when other more related to news have in the past been passed along as not newsworthy enough.
An image of M Jackson's corpse is newsworthy, but someone standing in line at his funeral, which is easily portrayed half a million miles away, is not.
Has DT gone extreme over Michael Jackson's death. How about me holding up a sign for Farrah Fawcett ? would that be accepted too as editorial.

Be objective? It's editorial and I think DT has gone off the rocker.

what attracted me to you is the headlines that you have attachments to German Telekom, or something like that. but what made me hesitate is you have commentors review and ratings. this is too flickr or amateurish. sounds too much like mostphotos.
if you get rid of the ratings by people, and just stick to being a stock site, i am sure you will get more people here interested in trying. but if you are just too much interested in being another flickr, mostphotos,etc...  not so good.

I'll be traveling in north india in august and I'm thinking about using the LX3 instead of my 400D, because of the awful performance of the EF-S 17-85. can't afford a decent lens before leaving.
mario[unquote]

some of the best equipment, computers, HDTV,etc are never advertised. As pros used to say for Sinar, Hasselblad,Rolleiflec,etc , "..because those who know already buy them". 
Lumix is not the flavour of the month. You don't see them like Nikon and Canon. Like the classic Leica, it carries the tradition of high standards, and like Leica and other cameras, you don't see them splashed all over the magazines or web.
The quality speaks for itself.

good points DWL.  esp the part on quality vs quantity.
I like the current small overhaul the Big 6 are going through these days ie. more rejection, more unhappy contributors. Am I crazy? No, not really.
As DWL said, "...uploading so-so images hoping they get through, feeling upset at rejections and the so-so images not getting views, zooms or sales, so the photographer then blames everyone else"
..."if the acceptance rate is falling or low, just add or change a goal to address this, by cutting the 10 uploads a week to 5 and looking at the content or workflow more."

there is a section of contributors who believe in flooding the sites and then cheering for 10--20% revenue of the port size. instead of giving only the best images.
they shoot themselves in the foot doing this. why? your so so images flood the selection with 0 dls 0 views . if you submit less images, the site has less useless or redundant images, which increase your chance as well as everyone else's
to get more dls. the buyers get what they want, instead of getting one of your so so images. and this improves the business.

but most of us don't think like that. so the sites have to slash and burn. and now we see more rejections. bad news for many, but good news for those who upload less but best.

I too did not vote because I could not see this option:
I AM HAPPY but WITH SUBSCRIPTION GETTING MORE COMMON AND COMMISSIONS GETTING SMALLER, PAYOUT SHOULD BE LOWERED TO THE SAME PROPORTION.
eg..  commissions used to be $1, 2, + payout = $100
 but now commissions are more common to be 0.30cts. payout should be /3  or /4 = $25.

I don't think it has anything to do with your monitor. Some reviewers pick whatever is closest to represent their rejection reason. Vague , perharps but it's not something we are unaccustomed.
I once had an image rejected because I changed the colour profile. I don't do any post processing out of the ordinary. I never touch the colour profile in camera or in photoshop. It's the same for all the hundreds or even thousands of RAW images that went through my cameras and PS. Still I do get the odd rejection with this reason.
I simply don't bother with it, and write it off as one of those canned responses. No need to waste your energy on just one image. You can produce a lot more with that same wasted energy by moving on and taking more new photos for uploading.

gostwyck, she is probably a very good photographer,no doubt. also an even better business person, or else she would not have succeeded in getting a featured interview.  all very excellent marketing with lots of marketing hooks, therefore the DEFINITIVE STATE , blah blah blah. like the great ubiquitous McD, "we serve XXXmillions a day" , rather than the small print hidden in the corner restaurant that serves the best dishes from the Cordon Bleu school .
the point again, is just that. McD serves and sell more than that little quaint restaurant where one pay money for a chef who cooks up the best meal you can taste to go along with their best wine.  McD a great success serves nothing like that.
They give you generics with speed and quantity. Much like stock photography.

So, to compare stock photography with fine arts is like telling me that you go to McD for their "fine dining".  If you do that, it is you trying to convince me that
your taste of the great McD is as good as fine dining.

Only someone who has not tasted fine dining (no quotes this time) will think that is wishful thinking. No rembrandt, da vinci, michelangelo,etc.. not even Avedon, in micro stock. Sorry!

There is a BIG difference. I shoot for stock, I shoot for fine arts. I don't try to tell everyone that my stock work is as good as fine art.

Interesting anecdote , tan!

But some images do last forever. Only you have to be Ansel Adams, Cecil Beaton, Karsh, W Eugene Smith, Henri Cartier Bresson. You don't even have to worry about keeping them for yourself, a curator will do it for you.
The moral of the story being ... If you want your images to last forever,
GET GOOD, GET GREAT, GET FAMOUS.

 That being said, I wonder if any micro, or any ,stock photographer will ever make it to the Smithsonian .

I think a lot of people miss the notion that most (traditional) buyers when it comes to images under 50 bucks are not that price sensitive. So if the image is priced 4, 14, or 40 bucks it wont matter alot.  Having the right image is the most important.

JOhn, you may be right. Howveer, remember Photo Shelter? They had the same vision as you did. When they closed down, the CEO said the problem was trying to break the mindset of the buyers to pay more for better images. They even took on Getty directly in their forum, which I am sure you remember as you had that on your front page as well. As we see micro getting close and closer towards free images, how do you propose to (break the mindset of the buyers to pay more) ?

This is not a contradiction to your response to tan510jomat. I too wish you succeed with your own vision with Cutcaster.

Quote from: sjlocke on June 22, 2009, 22:34

Can I have one for my tupperware business?

LOL, why, are you gonna start making official Tupperware announcements that might be called into question?

Sean got a good business here. tupperware is unbreakable. very useful for throwing when you get a rejection for your new uploads 
yes, Sean, i'll take a dozen of the assorted ones. in orange if you please 

Kodachrome rocked for me . If only we get a digital equal to it. O well, everything comes to past . Many of my Kodachrome slides are still in great shape, outlasting the Agfa, Ekta, and Fuji -chromes.

Quote from: Milinz on June 22, 2009, 05:07

I don't buy your oppinion about 'different needs and culture' - that is crap!
Stock Image is either good or not - No one can persuade me that there is something as LCV or 'not needed' for good stock image!

The other thing is about 'new' or 'old' images... That is crap too! Buyers will buy image they need - not the new one or old one... It is really not relevant for buyers if image illustrates what is needed to illustrate.

Well, his theory was pretty much confirmed by the email that Cathy got. They may edit their collection however they choose. If you don't agree with their editing philosophies, then perhaps they are not a good match for your efforts, and your time would be better spent uploading to an agency that accepts everything you send them.

Yes, whatalife understands what I meant by CULTURE.
Milinz, I answer to you on your latest bant (banding) but I will repeat it here for your convenience:
-
You said you are a reviewer. I am shocked that you do not respect another reviewer's judgement for the agency they work. This is what I meant on the other site when I said - the culture of a site . It's not crap, it's what the site tells their reviewers the criteria of what is wanted and what is not.
As whatalife mentioned there too, if you disagree, you can always stop uploading to IS, or Veer, and perharps, upload to the site you review. This way, you don't have to keep crapping on how everyone is unfair to you here on MSG.  --

And exclusive. In return you get a better positioning in the search engine and instant level 5. You also get the halo effect which I was mentioning. I don't care if it's "trapped" since I have no intention to leave DT. As far as I can see, there are only 2 reasons to remove an image(s) from microstock: (a) exclusive buyout, but only DT has it, so it's not applicable, or (b) going exclusive somewhere.

THis special treatment you get only if your image wins the assignment. It doesn't mean every one who submits to the assignment get this better position,  instant level 5,etc