Quit Your Belly-achin'!

Not Willing to Compete?

Get Out of the Race!

I recently read this blog The Bill Gates Mystery: An Open Letter From Piño Granata. Basically. Piño is asking Bill to "step up" and do something for the art community if he's going to monopolize the creative world.

I feel a strong need to comment.

I’m not going to defend Bill Gates or, for that matter, the heirs of J. Paul Getty – also mentioned in the letter. These are smart investors who see a huge opportunity in the stock industry. Yes, consolidation has happened in the industry. But, that's not necessarily a bad thing. Great companies often disappear when their industry changes. I saw many companies vanish into thin air during the dot com. Remember MetaCreations? Or, how about LivePicture? Great artists disappear too! Where is Kai Krause?

History has taught us that one (whether a corporation or an individual) must be willing and able to adapt to one’s new environment. This is a lesson that the U.S. auto industry has been learning for years.

Like Artists, Stock Photo agencies also need to re-evaluate themselves. If the competition is tough, consider a change in strategy. Just like back in the day when the Stock Photo business emerged, photographers screamed "the sky is falling." The sky never fell. Then, enter royalty-free stock photos. Once again, photographers screamed "the sky is falling." I looked out my window this morning and the sky was still there. This fear needs to stop.

Seriously. Technology has changed our businesses in many ways. No longer are image buyers beholden to stock houses - charging "bookoo bucks" for an image search, then having to wait for special delivery only to sift through someone elses hand chosen selections of their perception of what the buyer is looking for... In the old days, 2 - 3 days later could quite possibly result in yet another image search. Today, the same buyer jumps on the web - finds their image - downloads it and is off to the next project. Amazing! Today’s art buyer has choices and they are in charge. The web allows them to quickly search for best price, best selection, best fill-in-the-blank. They can browse collections from all around the world from the comfort of their home. Many stock agencies will even "put the word out" to their network of creatives to see if they can locate a specific image for a customer.

Investors are just now learning of the stock industry. That should tell you something. Desktop publishing has opened up new opportunities for a photographer to sell images to untapped markets, to untold millions of new buyers. This industry will grow because “a picture is worth a thousand words” and to us photographers, pictures are worth thousand’s of dollars.

I’m personally excited about the future of the Stock industry as both an entrepreneur and a photographer.