Well, as expected, there's ongoing consolidation in the microstock industry and Getty continues to flex its muscles as it looks like it's trying to introduce some customer segmentation into the market. It now looks like it's aiming for three tiers of microstock:
1.) Free - Stock.xchng - with explicit upselling to iStockphoto*
2.) Cheap - iStockphoto*
3.) Premium - Vetta* (for selective exclusive imagery)
There are then partnership models in-place with the likes of Photos.com - yes, it is very confusing!
That leaves one of its other recent Jupiter acquisitions, StockXpert* a little exposed - it's in direct competition to iStockphoto*. If it's retired/merged, it will be a real shame, as its upload interface (especially compared to iStockphoto*) is simple. Commissions at iStockphoto* for photographers are lower though, so there's an inevitability about it all. This may explain why a batch of my latest photos haven't been reviewed at StockXpert*.
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