186 The Future of Microstock Photography
The biggest single expense the microstocks have is marketing. They
need to market to achieve penetration and reach the guys like my Web
designer friend and his friends. If they do that and keep growing, I see
no reason why the best microstock sites should not eat further into
and up through the market shares of the major players like Getty and
Corbis. There is nothing to stop them except themselves, or their
owners, which is where I come to the fi rst threat I foresee to the con-
tinued success of the microstocks.The Wolf Eats the Lamb
Getty owns iStockphoto, Jupiter Images owns Stockxpert, and Corbis
has a microstock start-up in SnapVillage. I recall a fear expressed
before Getty acquired iStockphoto that the major traditional libraries
would buy up and shut down the microstocks to preserve their high-
value core business. For a while after Getty gave Bruce Livingstone
and friends the lifestyle they no doubt deserve as innovators by pur-
chasing iStockphoto, everyone held their breath to see what Getty
would do. What is happening is that iStockphoto is being increasingly
integrated in the Getty empire. Bruce Livingstone has taken a promo-
tion within Getty; Getty’s search engine has been adapted for use by
iStockphoto. I guess the risk is that the major players will ensure the
microstocks survive while at the same time protecting their core busi-
nesses from their effects.
However, I now see this as less likely, despite the Getty takeover.
There are simply too many microstocks to kill them off or control them,
unless their owners all decide to cash in, and it is now too late to close
down a market so recently opened up and expanding. In fact, if the
microstocks do not service that market, community sites like Flickr
will do so. Jon Oringer tells me, “We have spent a considerable time
investing in our brand and marketing our products. Companies who
opt for short-term success instead of long term will, eventually, have
to close or partner to survive.” This, to me, sounds like a manifesto
for independence.Consolidation
While I believe, therefore, that the microstocks will survive, we are
likely to see some market rationalization and consolidation in the next
couple of years. Some of the smaller sites do not seem to be selling
very much. Most of the sales come from the top handful of sites (see
Chapter 10).
Like the dot-com boom of the late 1990s, there is likely to be a
shakeout, with some smaller sites closing, failing, or fading away to
obscurity. I will not try to predict which sites those might be. However,