StockPhotoTalk | Special Interest Blog

Thinkstock, iStockphoto´s second Subscription Service

(Edited 02-05-10) For apparent reasons I can´t hardly comment whether the pricing of Getty Images´ new subscription website Thinkstock/Thinkstockphotos (does anyone remember?) or that 25-images-per-day thing are innovative or not.

The idea for the announced image packs, despite the different number of image downloads (5, 25, 100 and 250), was apparently copied from the mother-of-all-subscription-plans, Shutterstock, and their On Demand subscriptions with 5, 12, 25 and 60 downloads.

Doing some comparing searches on Thinkstock with only one keyword and different sources of images, the pure number of images from iStockphoto on Thinkstock seems to be impressive: from 38% over 44% and 54% up to 58% in various seach results. -You might of course get different results when searching.

More details here and here.

Related:

• Getty Images Begins Rolling Out New Subscription Formats (PaidContent):
  "The company plans to roll out a variety of subscription formats over the next five months that aims to capture customers with small budgets, such as individual bloggers ... Klein said: "This new subscription service brings together 3.5 million images."
  Getty is still wrestling with ways to make money from mobile. Klein sees potential there, but “nothing immediate.” Getty considers gaming to be a particularly lucrative area. “The gaming space continues to grow and developers have an insatiable appetite for images."
• Getty Images launches subscriptions (BJP)
• Did Getty Just Repackage Its RF Dregs? (PDN)

QuickLinks For 2009-03-04

• Latest Jupiterimages Layoff Survival Guide from Oprah with adequate image:
  
  "Have you been laid off?
  
  Are you afraid you might lose your job?
  
  Here is a quick and easy guide to surviving - and planning for - what will happen if you have to face a layoff."
  
  (LO)

           

• Phishing Attack Takes Down iStockPhoto on TechCrunch:
  "iStockphoto has been hit with a phishing attack. All users who have logged into the site today are being instructed to change their passwords (presumably because they have been compromised) and the site´s homepage has been taken down." ... but is up and running again.
  Related iStock forum post.

Getty Images on the WMBD/WYZZ Story

On the previous "Layoffs at Jupiterimages/Getty Images" posting Getty Images commented:

"It is our intention is to bring together the best of each company's assets and people to better serve our customers. As with any acquisition, there will be areas of work duplication and overlap between the two organizations being brought together, creating redundancies. As a result, some Jupiterimages employees in the US will be leaving within the next 60 days. There will be some employees who will be asked to stay on for a longer transition period to help with the integration.  Regarding offices, in the US, a few key JupiterImages offices will remain open based on business need and building requirements. However, it is likely that the JupiterImages employees who stay with Getty Images will eventually move to an existing Getty Images office location. In EMEA, Jupiterimages is following statutory requirements for any employee redundancies."

Layoffs at Jupiterimages/Getty Images

From WMBD/WYZZ, Jupiter Images Lays of 100 Peoria Workers:

"Jupiter Images, originally known as Dynamic Graphics, employed a total of 400 people worldwide.

Company CEO Alan Mechler [see note below] tells us they lost 40% of their business after what he calls a 'technology internet revolution' changed their competitive landscape.

Mechler says the images the company used to sell for $300 a piece could now be purchased for as little as $3 by competitors. Thus leaving the company no other option but to sell the company to Getty images or go bankrupt.

All 400 worldwide employees from England to Australia will be laid off between April and September. One hundred of those employees are based in Peoria."

Merry Christmas with Alan Meckler

   

A Holiday Message From mediabistro.com: "Anti-Santa Laurel Touby visits the mediabistro.com office and provides helpful alternatives to gifts before the tables get turned on her". Original video here or here. (Thx, LO)

"On September 24, 2008, Meckler and Klein exchanged several emails and text messages"

This super long SEC filing (Dec. 4th) from Jupitermedia describes the long process between Jupitermedia and parties potentially interested in acquiring Jupiterimages or parts of it.

Bottom line: due to the current economical crisis the acquisition price fell from initially $145 million to $120 million over $75million to finally $96 million.

Pino Granata: For Photography Big Is Bad

After the acquisition of Jupiterimages Getty Images will become bigger and will gain more share of the market.

As Clark Gable said, I don´t give a damn.

Now we´ll have over ten millions of LIFE pictures on Google which is quite a lot of competition for agencies which specialize in historical pictures.

The good thing about this operation is that, as it seems, Life is not going to charge for private usage and that we´ll have the chance to see the treasure that is the LIFE collection. I´m very, very excited about that.

This is something that our friend Bill should have done with the Bettman collection years ago.

Jupiterimages Revenues

From Jupitermedia´s recent SEC filing:

"The decrease in revenues during the three and nine months ended September 30, 2008 is due primarily to declines in direct sales of royalty-free single images and CD-ROMs and in sales from third party distributors, partially offset by an increase in subscription revenues. This was mainly due to changes in the images industry, including the emergence of competitive image offerings such as micropayment."

Which sounds exactly like the last quarter ("Jupitermedia 10-Q filing", Aug. 13, 2008).

Related: 

• Jupitermedia Corporation Reports An Adjustment to Its Results For The Third Quarter Ended September 30, 2008 (Nov. 11, 2008):
  Reporting a corrected operating income loss of $42,108 million (instead of initially $2,108 million) and (instead of initially $22,622 million) a net loss of $62,622 million for the three months ended Sept.30, 2008, respectively (instead of initially $27,018 million) a net loss of $67,018 million for the nine month ended Sept. 30, 2008.
• Shares of JUPM are currently down to $0.215, with a new 52Wk Low of $0.21.
• P.S.: shares of A21 are currently at $0,002.

QuickLinks For 2008-11-07

• Jupitermedia Q3/2008 results and conference call:
  "I just called the replay number for the conference. It appears no one bothers to listen. There were no questions. How sad is that?" (reader´s comment).
  
  •More details here.
  •Full PDF report here.
  •Jupiterimages/Getty Images FAQ: Internal Use Only - Do Not Distribute.

Pino Granata: Errare humanum est, perseverare diabolicum

There are very deep changes in the industry and all are very bad.

Alan Meckler has sold Jupiterimages to Getty Images and we can imagine why he sold. If I remember well he bought PictureArts for $65 millions and he made other acquisitions that somebody says have cost around $170 millions dollars including PictureArts so I realize that in selling Jupiterimages for $96 millions Alan Meckler and his shareholders have lost some money.

Maybe it was a good choice and by selling he has saved his company from bankruptcy which is a bad thing.

Slowly but safely Getty Images is going to have the monopoly of the industry which is not good news for us. Now I hear the news from Corbis.

Jupiterimages to be sold to Getty Images for $96 million

So where had Alan been?

In Spring 2007 it sounded like a $450 million deal (the New York Post story), now it comes down to $96 million which will "allow Jupitermedia to pay off all of its bank debt".

Getty Images´ press release, followed by Jupitermedia´s press release for Jupiterimages.

More financial details here in the last two paragraphs of this article at 24/7 Wall St.