184 The Future of Microstock Photography
In the last decade of the 20th century, the major traditional players,
Getty and Corbis, helped to revolutionize the stock industry by acquir-
ing a range of smaller libraries, incorporating their content, digitizing
it, and moving a proportion of their huge databases online. They dwarf
in size the largest microstock agencies. Corbis has somewhere around
100 million images and a turnover of $250 million or thereabouts. Getty
earns even more. Compare this with the larger microstock agencies,
with around 2.5 million images and a turnover in the single-digit
million-dollar range and you will see how big a gap there is between
the new kids on the block and the established players. Alamy, launched
in 2001, is smaller than Getty and Corbis but is entirely Internet based,
just like the microstocks, and offers strong competition, particularly in
the editorial sector.
Over recent years, these giants of photographic retailing have
secured key contracts for the provision of images to a range of
top businesses. They have extensive international contacts and
recognized brand names. But, hold on a moment. Has not Getty
recently paid $50 million for iStockphoto? What about Corbis
establishing SnapVillage, or Jupiter Images acquiring Stockxpert?
What can we deduce from these developments and from the
incredible growth enjoyed from start-up libraries like Fotolia, with
well over two million images added to its database in a couple
of years?
I deduce this: photography is ubiquitous and the barriers to entry
low for library start-ups and for their contributing photographers. It is
a paradigm of the new phenomenon of “crowdsourcing” (Figure 12.1),
where work traditionally done by defi ned groups of employees or
specialzeds is handed to and undertaken by the public at large
or a nebulous and uncontrolled portion of it—basically a crowd!
That includes you and me, by the way. It’s nice to feel part of
the crowd.
Certain media are highly susceptible to the crowdsourcing phenom-
enon, including photography. Think back to Chapter 1, where I
listed the reasons I thought that the microstock revolution was
inevitable: the Internet, fast and cheap broadband connections, and
digital cameras. With the cost, time, and much of the effort removed,
the distance between the producer of photography and the buyer
has been greatly reduced. The libraries are receiving from you, the
photographer, a product that is ready to sell with no further work
needed, save a decision, taken in seconds online, about whether to
accept or reject it. The microstocks do not need, and do not have, plush
corporate headquarters or many staff members to pay for. Their
business exists on hard drives and in cyberspace. Perhaps they
come closer to that 1980s dream of the paperless offi ce than most
other businesses.