Corbis to enter Microstock

Corbis, one of the main macrostock agencies, has announced that they plan to enter microstock in the next few months. This will add to the other major macrostock agencies who already have microstock agencies:

Getty : istockphoto (bought last year for $50m)
Jupiter : StockXpert
Inmagine : 123RF

What hasn't been said is whether they intent to buy one of the existing stock sites or whether they are going to start from scratch.

Extract from article:

Title: Micro-stock momentum
Date: 21 March 2007
In an exclusive interview, Steve Davis, CEO of Corbis, reveals the company's new ambitions in the micro-stock market and why he isn't concerned about Getty's recent spending spree. Katie Scott reports
Corbis says it intends to enter the micro-stock market, competing with archrival Getty Images for a slice of one of the fastest growth areas in royalty-free picture licensing.
In an exclusive interview with BJP, Corbis CEO Steve Davis said the company is aiming for a leadership position in the market for low-cost micro-stock imagery, where images are typically supplied by amateur photographers and sold for as little as $1. He promised that Corbis will make a splash with the launch of a new service in 'the next few months'.

http://www.bjp-online.com/public/showPage.html?page=439022

Feb microstock photo statistics

Well ... February went off like a frog in a sock. Not quite a best ever month but well up on last month and definately recovered from the christmas slowdown.

Below are percentages for the month to show how I have been going:

33% shutterstock (BEST EVER MONTH - BEM)
14% dreamtime
7% Fotolia
19% istockphoto (BEM)
6% bigstockphoto
7% 123RF
7% StockXpert
3% Featurepics
0% Canstock
0% Galastock
3% LuckyOliver (BEM)

shutterstock out did itself again with another best ever month. New uploads certainlyl helped it along but I was consistantly getting DL from my old photos too so it is not just the "new photo effect" which is evident at shutterstock .

istockphoto is starting to come into its own after a recent push to get more of my photos on their. There upload system is the worst and is restricted to 15 per week which isn't good when you are trying to play catch up.

dreamtime did well and they have just introduced new prices this month. It will be interesting to see if income improves.

The next four were pretty even, though a late come back by StockXpert saved the day for it. Apparently they changed the search criteria.