aaron emanuel litvinoff Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p>Dear all,<br>I used to use this site back in 2003, but took a hiatus and am now back in the game. Some things appear to have changed, though, or maybe they haven't, correct me if I'm wrong. I seem to recall that there wasn't an upward restriction on amount of images one could upload. I might be wrong, though. Anyhow, what's happened is that now I can't upload any more. The website says: "In general, if you submit all of your photos for critique in the Critique Forum, you will always have enough quota to upload a few more." I would like to upload more for critique, but obviously can't. I don't want to delete the other stuff, as it's rather good and has quite a lot of comments etc. I don't want to subscribe because I'm not rich and I don't want to make anyone else rich. What do you suggest? <br>Aaron<br>PS I understand that if I write photo critiques I can get more credits but the extent to which I would need to in order to get more is not really transparent.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmj Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p>I can appreciate the fact that you may not be rich and are not interested in making anyone else rich, but running this site does actually cost money. Josh will have many more details about the site operation and the people who might be getting rich (or not -- I don't know). But, really, how can we suggest anything else but to pay for services you want to use?</p> <p>Maybe a subscription would make a nice birthday present for someone to give to you?</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaron emanuel litvinoff Posted May 11, 2009 Author Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p> <p> <p>I was hoping that someone else might respond. It's obvious you and your friends want my money. That's not informative to me. You pay if you want to, this user's not for paying. And neither are many, if not most, people who use this site. The point is, I've contributed as many photos as I can to the site, as well as numerous critiques, and I am happy to contribute more, even though by uploading these photographs, Photo.net gets <b>"a perpetual non-exclusive world-wide royalty-free license to modify, publish and reproduce that material for the purpose of operating, displaying, distributing and promoting photo.net"</b>. If I'm giving photo.net what amounts to an unlimited license to my own work for free, I think that is payment enough, and I certainly don't expect to have to make a further, pecuniary sacrifice as well. That would be, as we say in England, taking the piss. </p> <p>Anyway, back to the point at hand: the website actually says that for the benefit of non-paying users like myself, and I repeat for your attention, <b>"In general, if you submit all of your photos for critique in the Critique Forum, you will always have enough quota to upload a few more."</b> That has nothing to do with paid for service. I want to know how to make this work in practice, as well as get more upload credits for my critiques. Please only respond if you respect this commonly held objective.</p> </p> </p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pmj Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p>Just to be clear: I am a volunteer for this website. I don't get paid for my services.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshroot Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p>That statement was created at a time when the critique forum was just getting started and was in need of some encouragement to get things going. At the moment, we have the opposite issue, there are too many submissions and not enough critiques to that forum. So the ability of people to increase their gallery quota without paying by just dumping images into the critique forum has been reduced.</p> <p>Photo.net costs a ton to run. It simply isn't cheap. I fully understand if you aren't interested in paying money to a website. But you also need to understand that we could not exist without subscription and advertising revenue. Nobody is getting rich here.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pboraschi Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p>Aaron, you are right when saying that there was no quotas on uploading when you originally joined, but not to throw matches at anyone here, I do think that 2,09$ a month is dirt cheap for an online service. There are other photo sites out there that are 100% free.<br> Like Josh is pointing out, this type of site is expensive to maintain especially the ones with high traffic. I won't speculate on the bandwidth this site generates but i found this document online entitled: <a href="aduni.org/courses/systems/courseware/lect_notes/Lecture_15_Case_Study_Photo.net.ppt">Case Study: Photo.net</a> which state that in 2001 there was an average of 700,000 unique visitors per month with 90k registered users. This type of website does not go cheap especially when Akamai is involved...<cite></cite> <cite></cite> <cite><br /> </cite><br> The licence that we (you) grant photo.net is to help promote the site nothing more. So what if the operators of this site get rich? I actually would wish them that much, the information i have gained over the years to better my shooting skills is well worth over that token fee of 25$ per year.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lex_jenkins Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p>Aaron, another perspective I occasionally try to emphasize, tho' not often successfully, is the recognition factor. Photo.net appears to have an unusually high Google prominence, so anyone who actively participates on photo.net will benefit from that participation in terms of Google prominence.</p> <p>Some photographers may see that as a very tangible benefit that translates to bottom line terms. Considering the vast webscape and the difficulty in gaining any web recognition whatsoever, let alone prominence, that particular aspect of photo.net means that some non-subscribers who are serious amateurs or even pros are gaining tremendous benefit at no cost to them other than in the time it takes to participate here.</p> <p>For other participants that may not be an important factor. So the value is relative to their priorities. But for the photographer who does value web recognition it's hard to beat the value added by participation on photo.net.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bobatkins Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 <p>I don't think you need to be particularly rich to afford a membership that costs 7 cents a day. If you find the site useful and valuable, you should subscribe. If you don't wish to subscribe, that's fine, but then you really have no grounds to complain if your access is more restricted than subscribers.</p> <p>Non-subscribers are more limited in the number of critique requests they can make and the number of images they can upload to their portfolio.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaron emanuel litvinoff Posted May 13, 2009 Author Share Posted May 13, 2009 <p>Recap. My original question was about how to make the "submit all photos for critique - always have enough quota to upload a few more" principle work in practice, as well as how to get more upload credits for my critiques, without paying any more than has already been paid by granting photo.net an unlimited license to my work, which is payment enough. This original post has not been answered, therefore, all the other posts have failed. I politely request, again, that posters do not reply unless they can answer my question.<br> In addition to the original question (which still needs answering, if you would be so kind) - Pascale, can you tell me which 100% free sites you have used? (without extolling the widely publicised virtues of photo.net)<br> Thanks<br> <p > </p> </p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshroot Posted May 13, 2009 Share Posted May 13, 2009 <p>Aaron,</p> <p>Please read my reply above. That sentence is out of date and no longer applies. If you want to submit stuff to the critique forum and not be a subscriber, you are going to have to delete images. If you want to have a big portfolio, you are going to have to pony up the $25/yr. It costs a lot of money to run this site and while we don't force people to pay to use any part of the site, we do reward those who support us by subscribing.</p> <p>I will go and remove that info now to stop further confusion.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaron emanuel litvinoff Posted May 13, 2009 Author Share Posted May 13, 2009 <p>You never said that it didn't apply, just that it was a bit anachronistic. OK, thanks for clarifying, now you can't be accused of double standards. You did waffle on about how much the site costs to run, however. That's superfluous, predictable and repetitive.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joshroot Posted May 13, 2009 Share Posted May 13, 2009 <p>Not sure what you are talking about. My two statements on the cost of running the site were "Photo.net costs a ton to run. It simply isn't cheap." and "It costs a lot of money to run this site". Both are true and both are saying the same thing. Running photo.net = a bunch of money.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pboraschi Posted May 13, 2009 Share Posted May 13, 2009 <p>Aaron, why are you so aggressive?<br> For free sites out there you may try Flicker, Picassa or even Facebook. Read the fine prints though, i think Facebook takes ownership of your photos...</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sketch_tbhotmail.com Posted May 14, 2009 Share Posted May 14, 2009 <p>They certainly do but only so they can resize photos to display them on the website. I don't think I've ever seen any ads for facebook that include members' photos, come to think of it, I've never seen photo.net use any members' photos to advertise their site either...</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kelly_flanigan1 Posted May 14, 2009 Share Posted May 14, 2009 <p>Aaron; posting images for critique for free is free advertising for you.<br> <br /> You have exposure to the world for nothing.</p> <p>You are not paying for the upkeep of the server; the bandwidth; the electricity; the management.<br> <br /> A site cannot provide an infinite amount of free services; that is why one has to be a member upload beyond X number of images. The same goes with other forms of welfare or free gifts. One can go back 100 years ago and it was considered bad practice for trick or treater to be given more that Y pieces of candy; if he demanded the house owners entire evenings stash/supply he was considered greedy; inconsiderate; one who is selfwish.<br> <br /> The whole amount you are torn about ; 25 dollars is less than what you computer draws in a year in electricity. Its is about what a months worth of dialup costs; or twice to 4 times what cable or dsl costs per month. If you used your local newspaper as advertising one could post one stamp sized image for one day for that 25 dollars.<br /> <br /> If you seek an actual commercial client instead of critiques; not having a spare 25 dollars means you might not have enough gas money for gasoline; money for a blank CD; or money for a phone call or phone.<br /> <br /> Most businesses fail in short order; under capitialization. Getting world wide exposure for 25 dollars per year is in the noise; trivial compared to other costs in a business.<br /> <br /> Uploading images to photo.net is not a payment at all. That is flawed logic.<br /> Its costs photo.net for all that free welware of serving images for free. Uploading images is not a payment at all. Its costs some money to serve images; provide the disc space and bandwidth.<br /> <br /> It appears that you are upset that you have to pay beyond a free amount of images. You want to upload a zillion images and have others pay for the bill?<br /> <br /> Explain how this "give me something for nothing" business model works if every non member uploads thousands of images and the server bogs; bandwidth gets limited and the whole site massively bogs?. There has to be some income to support welfare and handouts. The government cannot give 1 million to each person; nor can photo.net host 1 million images per person for free.<br /> Draw a control diagram around the server; money from adverts and advertising support the bandwidth of the hosted images.<br /> <br /> Please explain you own business model for unlimited uploads and unlimited bandwidth.<br /> <br /> Maybe you call give away reprints of you work on an unlimited basis too; thus somebody wants 1000 free 8x10's; you absorb this cost? Do you tax your neighbor? do not waffle. Explain how a business can provide an infinite amount of free sevices. Answer the question.</p> <p> </p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kelly_flanigan1 Posted May 14, 2009 Share Posted May 14, 2009 <p>Here I look at images all day long; thus the critique thing seems very odd. In actual commerical work one has a real life emotional client to please; one with a schedule; one that has corporate colors to match; one that has iffy dreams to pull out of their heads and try to make into their images. Even with local feedback from a client it is not a straight foreward process; its messy; lossy; one has reshoots and scrap; and losts of crap to put up with. With a critique you are trying to get praise from a host of unknowns; for an image that has no defined purpose; thus folks whine if their report card is fair or poor.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aaron emanuel litvinoff Posted May 14, 2009 Author Share Posted May 14, 2009 <p>When I ask for a critique, I'm not looking for praise without at least as much criticism. If someone could rip my images to shreds I would actually love it. I don't do it for the glory.<br> Kelly, I was simply trying to get an answer for how to utilise and maximise the free aspects of the site, <i>as was publicised on the site itself.</i> This was something that photo.net had stated - that so long as one contributes to the site in terms of work and critique, then one would have enough upload credits. <i>This was part of their business model.</i> I operated in this system before the new rules were brought in, and enjoyed it. It seemed fair to me. I spent my time contributing critiques to the community, I got some back.<br> I asked a question about how to utilise these free components of the site, nobody answered, and then it was realised that there was a clash of systems here - the stated system, which was outdated, and the system in practice. This has now been resolved. I've subscribed, uploaded a new set, made 16 critiques today alone, and have a big fat '7' next to my name, just like you. I can still see ads though. Feel free to check out my images.</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pboraschi Posted May 14, 2009 Share Posted May 14, 2009 <p>I think this post is resolved in some way.<br> Aaron was right with his initial comment and the nuances have been fixed by Josh. The unfortunate thing when working with such a complex site is that it is easy to overlook certain elements. Does the Photo.net group have a full time lawyer on staff that can make sure all legal docs are up-to-date? probably not.<br> I deal on a regular basis with clients that just wait for that precise moment when something will go in their favour to demand extra work from you at no extra charge...This world would truly be better if people would be reasonable. I think this is one of the best communities online, let's all play together in the sandbox</p> <p>So Aaron, welcome back!</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gungajim Posted May 20, 2009 Share Posted May 20, 2009 <p>There was once a little boy who said, "This is not to my liking; I am going to take all my marbles and go home."</p> Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now