The LinoType was a revolutionary machineat the time of its invention (1884). It allowed the user to set type by usinga keyboard instead of setting the type manually.
iStock has changed the world of stockphotography. Recently it has startedto do the same with video & audio. Ifyou had asked me about iStock fiveyears ago, my opinion was that it wasa collection of peoples' vacation photos,and sometimes you could find a goodphoto like a diamond in the rough.
But times have changed, and iStockhas grown up. In fact, the rise inpopularity of iStock has threatenedand/or re-defined the industry modelof how stock photos are sourcedand purchased.
However, iStock has now been absorbed by Getty Images. The prices have gone up (but so has the quality). And Getty has made a big effort to reign-in some of the lax ethics of publishing and copyright laws that were occurring at iStock during its formative years.
In iStock's past, many photographers were allowed to sell images of people (where their likeness is distinguishable) without model releases. Similarly, many photos of famous landmarks were being sold, but the problem was that some of these sites were property trademarked and could not be published in a for-profit manner (only editorial use). Getty has definitely come in and applied some order to iStock.
But the reason that Getty purchased iStock was because this new business model was threatening the way that the big three (Getty, Corbis, Superstock) do their business. In addition to owning iStock, Getty also owns another stock agency called Thinkstock. They are the other "microstock" site that has gained some traction in the marketplace. There is also a portion of iStock's collection that is available through Thinkstock. So as you can see, these upstarts are changing the face of the industry, but Getty is still king of the mountain because it has a hand in whatever plays out.
Will Corbis or Superstock rally their troops and come up with an answer to iStock & Thinkstock? Or is there another grassroots stock website that will challenge the model again, just like iStock did? And if so, will that start-up be bought-out by Getty as well.
Have you ever heard of a reverse image search?Its where you have an image and you upload it toa website like tineye, and it searches the web tosee if it can find the source of the photo.
I ran across this website and the concept of"reverse image searching" when I saw this videoabout this guy's photo that has traveled the world.It's a pretty amazing story about the power of animage in public and how it spread over the internet.
