Photo agency takeover

[Warren Toda]

Three days ago it was announced that Corbis Images was sold to Visual China Group (VCG) which is partnered with Getty Images. While VCG will distribute Corbis in China, Getty will take control of Corbis for the rest of the world. This basically means that Getty gets almost all of Corbis content which pretty much creates a monopoly.

Corbis sold most of its business so that it could go all-in into the celebrity/paparazzi business and also the advertising business.

There's never a merger without layoffs. Water always flows to the lowest level.

If you have a contract or images with Corbis, good luck.

[David Buzzard]

Getty is running out of money pretty quickly as well, so who knows how long they're going to be around either. 

Getty sent me an e-mail to contribute to their stock agency.  I put 10 photos in, just see what it all about, and then searched them.  It turns out they were giving the shots away for free, something that wasn't mentioned in any of the material they sent me, but probably buried in the contract boiler plate.  I don't know what MBA wonder came up with that idea, but giving your product away for free seems like a pretty stupid way to run a business, but what do I know, I just take the pictures.

I sent some celebrity shots from the Whistler film festival to my stock agency, Alamy, which is a European agency that handles a lot of editorial photos.  The shots sold, but for $1.00 US each, and then with the third party and Alamy commissions, I ended up with $0.30 a photo.  With rates that low, I don't know how a operation as large as Corbis is going to live off that.

[Andy Clark]

I have been a contributor to Corbis for about year and half now. I got an e-mail from them the morning of the announcement explaining roughly whats to happen. Apparently Getty is going to go through the list of contributors and pick out any they like and offer them a contract with Getty. Those that turn the Getty offer down or are not chosen can continue to contribute as normal. If they do not wish to remain with Corbis I do believe a mutual agreement ending the contract will be agreed to with the new owners.

Yes I heard there have been layoffs at Corbis. I do not know any details but some came as early as only hours after the announcement.....   

[Ben Nelms]

Getty Images’ co-founder and chairman, Jonathan Klein tweeted this after the deal was made:

"Almost 21 years but got it. Lovely to get the milk, the cream, cheese, yoghurt and the meat without buying the cow."

Very telling....

[Dominic Chan]

Getty will soon be bought out by VCG in my opinion.  Part of it is the currency game as any income to VCG will be in USD and is a plus when converting back to Chinese RMB and Chinese enterprises are the one who have cash these days. Getty and its egos killed the market with low low pricing and then comes Google that index just about anything and people think is free. 

I have a contract with Alamy, WENN, VCG, Barcroft Media, Everett Collections and CP Images to disseminate my entertainment stuff. What I found was that my stuff to WENN will end up in Alamy.  Everett Collections ends up in Rex and CP Images, Barcroft Media ends up on Getty. and vice versa, it's like a grand game of dog chancing its tail and never stop.  The corporate wins playing the money musical chair and the rest that actually makes the photo are "paying" to keep their game going.