Originally Posted by Delboy

Im ready to bet that 1000 of serious contributors united, lead by few top producers could make serious changes in this industry , and the number of hobbyists that are ready to supply their work under any circumstances and rules that any site sets could not replace them at least not in a short time.

Originally Posted by Delboy

Please , Rinder stop shooting numbers and rethink.

25,000 of us could pull our ports tomorrow and it wont affect any of them in the slightest

People who are concerned most are those who produce most , and if that number of contributor you mentioned pulled out the photos tomorrow from any site , that site could comfortably close the business , their buyers especially subscription buyers would go mad.

Next as I said before , those one that are rising the dust are the ones that produce most , and if average portfolio of 25000 of contributors that you mention has only 100 images that 2,5 millions images lost in a day.

Is it worth saying that most of serious contributors together have much more than the average of 100 images that I used , so that number would be much higher than existing number of all images in the industry.

Im ready to bet that 1000 of serious contributors united, lead by few top producers could make serious changes in this industry , and the number of hobbyists that are ready to supply their work under any circumstances and rules that any site sets could not replace them at least not in a short time.

And thats contributors wild card , "time" , if certain number of images goes away in a second , the sites would not have time to replace them before the buyers get pissed of and abandon the site.

But is always easy to say you know , be disappointed by the situation , and
and play smart one but not be ready to do nothing about it.

Sorry my friend , but all good from you that I read last few years falls in the water after this post of yours, and you were the last person I expected to talk this way , firing numbers and writing without thinking a second.

Wish you all good light

Originally Posted by rinderart

.....Just like the 28,000 at LO, They dissapeared. thats the truth!....you don't want the truth? Don't read me.Things are changing very quickly now just like i said a year ago...

Originally Posted by ReeF

I wonder what percentage of MS contributors actually treat this as a business - 1% maybe? It can't be very high. I'd imagine that the majority just do it for fun and some extra income. Oh sure, you get the odd talented person who knows how to work it and can make some serious money from it and of course you also get the odd person who thinks they have talent and thinks they will make money from it - but surely most of us just do it for fun and some pocket money and so most of what you say, Laurin, is irrelevant.

I would agree that those who have been doing MS for a while and who have greatly improved their skills should at least look at new avenues. I think many MS contributors would be quite surprised at how much they could earn from photography and illustration outside of MS.

Originally Posted by sharpshot

I haven't listened because I disagree. If 25,000 of us left, so would most of the buyers. They have some loyalty, don't you think they looked for your portfolio on other sites when you left Lucky Oliver? I don't think there are more than 5,000 top class photographers in the world. That is probably an overestimation. Would people wade through these new 25,000 contributors when most of the good ones have gone to sites that treat them decently?

There is still a big traditional market that I feel the microstock sites will continue eroding. We should see more buyers as the economic down turn bites and they are forced to move to the lower priced sites.