iStockphoto, the “David” to Corbis’ “Goliath”
Author of this post: Nomi Altabef | About Blog Authors »
When you think of Bill Gates, the words “financially challenged” probably don’t come to mind. I mean, let’s face it; things have pretty much been going his way. That is certainly true of Microsoft, but his lesser-known corporation, Corbis, is finding it hard to turn a profit. A photo-licensing business Gates started in 1989, Corbis has spent millions building an archive of the most beloved and iconic images in existence (think Marilyn Monroe over the subway grates) which it licenses for about $250 a pop. In addition, Corbis keeps a staff of professional photographers who generate stock images for clients in marketing, media, and advertising sects. This accounts for half of Corbis’s $250 million a year in sales—an impressive number, but not a profitable one.
The trouble is, Corbis is meeting with unexpected competition from the “little guys,” micro-stock photo agency sites that rely on the crowdsourcing approach, empowering their member communities of amateur or semi-pro photographers to post and sell their work for populist prices…MORE
April 23rd, 2007 at 3:42 pm
How can you call istockphoto a “little guy”? They’re owned by the biggest of Goliaths in the business: Getty Images.
April 23rd, 2007 at 5:15 pm
True, but they were bought by Getty to get in on the microstock business; iStockphoto wasn’t conceived by Getty.
April 23rd, 2007 at 9:35 pm
But now iStockphoto is benefiting from the $50 million dollars Getty paid for it.
The Getty Goliath faced the same “unexpected” competition and gobbled it up.
April 23rd, 2007 at 9:56 pm
Did they really gobble it up? Yes, Getty bought into the crowdsourcing/microstock movement by buying iStockphoto, but they are not trying to merge the two sites or cannibalize the communities– they’re leaving iStockphoto alone to continue developing and doing its thing. Here’s a quote from an article on Photo District News:
“It’s important for our professional photographers to understand that it’s completely separate,” says Getty director of photography and filmmaker relations Paul Banwell, adding, “It effectively means nothing changes. It’s business as usual.”
Similarly, iStock CEO Bruce Livingstone and vice president of marketing Kelly Thompson say their day-to-day operations will not change as a result of the sale to Getty.
“They want us to keep our culture. It’s what makes our site great,” Thompson says.
View article:
http://www.pdnonline.com/pdn/newswire/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001994651
April 24th, 2007 at 4:01 pm
They really gobbled it up.
First they eliminated iStockpro and then the Getty Goliath started plucking Diamond photographers from iStockphoto’s cozy community and putting them under Getty contracts.
http://www.stockphototalk.com/phototalk/2006/12/this_is_not_bas.html
Getty has said iStockphoto will be a minor part (under 10%) of their gargantuan business. That will protect the high prices they get for their professionals.
April 27th, 2007 at 2:03 pm
[...] 2. Photography doesn’t have to cost an arm and a leg. There are plenty of great stock photography venues online that have professional looking pictures at a very low cost. For some ideas, see Nomi Altabef’s recent post about iStockPhoto.com: http://www.notesondesign.net/?p=253. [...]