SeattlePi: "Flickr users, many of whom are amateurs, will be paid in the same manner as professionals if their images are used commercially. Getty customers usually pay between $29 and $200,000 for an image, depending on how freely they may use it. Photographers receive 30 percent to 40 percent of the licensing fee if the customer's rights to use the image are limited in scope or time, or 20 percent if the image may be used with fewer restrictions." - Thomas Hawk

Sounds good to me, would be nice to make a little bit of money... Being that my current income is somewhere around nothing... - Grant Bierman

i guess we'll hear more complaints from "pros" about having more competition and how hard it is to make a living. - moogs

@grant bierman : don't count on it though. you'll be competing with bajillions of other flickr users, in addition to the seasoned pros. your photo really has to stand out. - moogs

I'll be curious as to how seriously Getty markets the "Flickr" collection. The cynic might say that Getty is simply locking in Flickr away from competitors, especially #2 Corbis which is 100% owned by Bill Gates (which would make for an interesting play if MSFT acquired Yahoo). Whether or not Getty seriously markets these images or is simply playing lipservice remains to be seen. - Thomas Hawk

Current Getty photographers are probably pissed as hell about a new bunch of amateurs joining their ranks. Getty has always put a chasm the size of the Grand Canyon between their Pro work and the "substandard" work of amateurs who have all been directed to iStockphoto where they can sell their image for $1. It will be interesting to watch how they finally handle the admission that many amateurs are in fact just as good as the Pros. - Thomas Hawk

i doubt this leads to much for either group. yahoo doesn't own the world's largest collection of images. they own the best site for image sharing. we own our images. yahoo/flickr can't make a deal to sell our images. they can make a deal with getty to give getty better access to our images and our data. getty still has to talk to us about getting permission to sell our images. and what kind of headache is this going to create for getty? how many images on flickr have proper releases? how many photographers on flickr have any idea what a release is? i just don't know if this is anything more than hot air. it's a smart move to go through the collection and collect the best images they can, but i truly wonder just how many images it will end up being. - sam b-r

@ramil Yeah I know, it's best pretty much treat it as a lottery. You might win, but there is a whole lot of other players, so just enjoy the ride and not worry about it. - Grant Bierman

Sam, very good points. I too wonder how seriously they will take this. And I also wonder how this will sit with the Flickr community when a few get selected to make money and most do not. Still, I'm excited about the potential of the deal and think that if it's done right this could be a great avenue for Flickr photographers to begin earning money from their photos. So much is still to be determined. I hope it's not lip service or hot air. - Thomas Hawk

I'd prefer that flickr just roll out a feature that a) lets me mark which of my photos I want to and CAN sell (have the appropriate releases, resolution and such). b). exposes a tool/service/whatever so that other people can easily query flickr for photos c.) handles payments for me. - moogs

ramil: I agree. I don't understand why Flickr hasn't rolled something out like this already. - Justin Korn

Ramil, Flickr's not equipped to handle the administration of the stock photography business and Yahoo likely would not be willing to take on the liability. Also Getty is ahead of anyone else as far as marketing stock photography goes today. They are the 800 pound gorilla. Partnering probably makes more sense. - Thomas Hawk

I don't mean that they'll handle marketing too. Just that, the tools they're exposing to Getty could be exposed to other stock photo companies as well.......I guess that is indeed a nightmare to manage. - moogs

I agree with ramil but Tom is right. Flickr, to me, might not have the ways to do stock photos. - Outsanity

I wonder how much of Getty's decision to partner with Flickr was defensive, i.e. if MSFT were to get Flickr #2 Corbis which is 100% owned by Bill Gates would probably be better positioned to do a deal with Flickr than a Yahoo owned Flickr. - Thomas Hawk

Thomas: Is there any mention of who approached whom and when? I'm assuming Getty initiated it and if so, is there any reason to believe it was NOT a defensive move? - Justin Korn

pick me - Andrew Smith from fftogo

@Thomas "I wonder how much of Getty's decision to partner with Flickr was defensive" That sounds quite plausible, in which case, I'm skeptical that Getty will take this venture seriously, or only go through the motions to get their toe in the water so to speak. I'm also a little concerned about the rather low 20-40% cut that the photographer will receive. If that is the case, I would expect a significant amount of marketing and management services to be provided by Getty. - Jeff P. Henderson

Justin, no way to know. But I'm sure Getty and Flickr have been talking for years. When I met with the Getty BD people up in Seattle two years ago they told me about meetings with Flickr even way back then. My guess is Yahoo/Flickr was the hold out more than Getty. There was a rumor for a while that Yahoo was trying to buy their own stock agency. Could be that Getty sweetened the deal enough to keep Flickr out of the hands of Corbis, especially in light of a potential MSFT YHOO acquisition. - Thomas Hawk

What worries me about the deal is that it has the potential for Getty to make a deal and then just put it out on an island and not market it in order to appease their current stock pros who might jump ship and go to Corbis, etc. Plus I'm sure Flickr gets a cut and so they may make less money selling Flickr images than other Getty images. Who knows though, this is all total speculation. It will be interesting to see how it plays out though and I'm excited about the news and potential. - Thomas Hawk

I've always believed that Getty bought iStockphoto purely as a defensive play and purposely marketed it miles away from their Pros or fair prices for photos. it was giving lip service to the growing ranks of weekend warrior amateurs while keeping a potential serious competitor out of the business. - Thomas Hawk

What is funny is that iStockphoto in fact did steal business away from Getty's more lucrative high end core business. So their defensive move ended up shooting them selves in the foot so to speak. What photo buyers realized is that there were just as good quality photos in IStockphoto for a fraction of the cost. If Getty tries to categorize the Flickr photos into their high end portfolio, it may be a defensive move to try to gain back the high end market share they lost to iStock. - Jeff P. Henderson

Here is more details about what the licensing model may look like. http://strobist.blogspot.com/2008... - Jeff P. Henderson

I think this would make more sense if the majority of the accepted Flickr photos are sold through iStock. Otherwise, I feel the stakes are to high for Getty. The old pros could jump ship as Thomas writes. To appease the pros, Getty might see an opportunity to pay the Flickr photographers less than the old pros, and increasing their earnings. It's hard to predict how the different categories of people (pros, Flickr photogs, customers etc) will react to this deal. - Henrik Johansson

Thanks for the extra info on this deal Thomas, you've answered a few of the questions I'd posted elsewhere on another FF thread on this subject. Do you know if Getty is looking to boost its creative or editorial business with this or both. Do they see this as an answer to the Yahoo/Reuters iwitness style deal that was recently announced or more as a way to cut costs and boost their creative/illustrative businesses? - Jon Dillon

Do I have to relicense my photos, or does Getty want to pick ones and purchase them from me? - Andrew Feinberg

OH! how i wish for that future world you painted for me thomas, of zooomr's {original} "marketplace"... a real website where users had the power to take on stock image companies... for a second i thought that was what might be happening at flickr, but i'm still holding out for that ideal world.... i daydream about it sometimes.... - djp

Jon, I think this is a win for Getty largely because it will increase their breadth. Flickr has so many more images. When Choice Hotels licensed my Grand Lake Theater photo they did that directly with me because they found the image on Google Image search. Do a search for Grand Lake at Getty and you get nothing. This allows more meaningful search at Getty which will solidify them more as a first choice to look for photos with image buyers. - Thomas Hawk

@Henrik, Getty would be shooting themselves in the foot even more if they were to market Flickr photos though iStockphoto. It would further cannibalize their high end business. If you read the link I posted above it indicates that they will be selling Flickr photos along side their existing high end pro photos with a similar or the same pricing structure. What they are trying to do is keep from loosing sales from customers who are going directly to Flickr photographers instead of to Getty. - Jeff P. Henderson

Andrew, not sure how the relicensing might work. Details will be coming out in the next few months though I suspect. djp. yeah, Zooomr's original marketplace idea was a pretty good one. Photrade has a similar one in beta right now. Photographers get 80%. But neither Photrade nor Zooomr have the marketing clout of Getty in this business. I'm not saying one's better than the other. Much of it might depend on how well Getty ends up marketing this collection. - Thomas Hawk

My guess is that Flickr has a significantly larger selection of images in many categories. Savy Getty customers know this and go to Flickr to find what they want when they can't find it at Getty. Getty is smart to try to leverage this. I'm sure Getty knows better than anyone else where their collection is lacking and will be looking to Flickr to fill the voids. A smart move on their part. If they are doing this to fill voids, it should not piss off their existing pro photographers too much. - Jeff P. Henderson

Thomas: You underestimate istock far to much. If you look at sales volume, istock outranks Getty sales. While some photos are amateur, some are as professional as any at Getty. Each has their own niche. - CJPhoto

@Jeff: But what about those photos subjects that are already well serviced by the pros. Is there going to be some way of filtering out Flickr from your Getty search? If I search for the Effiel Tower on Getty, I get some great shots... Search on Flickr and you get some fairly average ones. Is Getty in danger of diluting it's photos catalogue and therefore souring their reputation for high quality? - Johnny Worthington

Marketplace was the reason why I originally choose Zooomr rather than Flickr. Now that Photrade has started it will be interesting to see if they ever get the numbers to make it a viable. Why doesn't Flickr just do it themselves? You don't need the marketing clout of Getty when you are Flickr! - CJPhoto

@CJPhoto, This is precisely why I believe that Getty will market Flickr photos along side their existing high end line and not through iStock. Buying iStock was a defensive move that ultimately hurt Getty's bottom line. - Jeff P. Henderson

CJ, iStockphoto has huge volume but never made any significant money. The real money at Getty was always made by their core traditional business. Getty kept the two as far apart as they possibly could. I agree with you though many of their photos are just as good as Getty's Pro stuff. - Thomas Hawk

@John, my guess it that Getty will be very selective as to what photos they choose from Flickr to add to their collection. Your example would suggest they already have an adequate number of Eiffel tower images, so they would not be looking for any from Flickr. This selective approach will not dilute their exiting catalog, but will only fill in where they have voids. - Jeff P. Henderson

While Flickr could "do it themselves" with a Photrade model, my guess is that they simply don't want to do the work or build the infrastructure necessary to compete in what is largely seen as a declining business. They probably also were afraid of the liability associated with screw ups and looked at Getty as the best in the business at this after coming to the conclusion that they didn't want to buy or build themselves. - Thomas Hawk

Getty likely gets to fill in holes in their library, add much greater depth to their search, and they probably have a contract that locks Flickr into an exclusive deal keeping them out of the hands of Corbis in the event of a MSFT buyout of Yahoo. - Thomas Hawk

These deals are rarely useful to the photographers. The trend is usually, sell your image for dimes with exclusive rights for ever and ever. - Mário Pires

I would like to point out that you will be very unlikely as an individual to make a lot of money if one or many of your images are selected, assuming of course this rumour does turn out to be real. In most cases rumours involving Getty turn out to be true as over the years they have aggressively taken over many picture libraries and indeed press agencies, including my old agency Wireimage and Filmmagic. So the news of Flickr getting involved disturbs me. - Nick Lewis

The explosion of "professional" photographers is driving the supply of product to record levels while the demand is rising modestly. The same could be said for blogging and journalistic product. Its not so easy to make a dollar any more at some very traditional jobs. Photography is one of those. - Robert

More details on the deal here: http://friendfeed.com/e... - Thomas Hawk