Tag Archives: phone

Microstock industry, dying….?

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It seems with the onslaught of new photographers, the new genre of stock photos (phone stock – a small list HERE) and the plethora of “free” photos on social media. The microstock industry is well, going down. I know it’s been noted for awhile now but now, it’s literally pennies. I’ve been getting 10 cents, I’ve read about some photographers on iStock/Getty’s getting 2 cents in the forums, HERE and HERE and some disgruntlement (justifiably so) HERE.

Now smaller sites like Envato are “adjusting their focus” in terms of their stock photos department, essentially saying their are culling and downsizing their contributor roster, details HERE. Not so small site, Fotolia was acquired by Adobe and although images are now seen/used/purchased by more industry pro’s, the commissions are going down. Is it a good trade off? For me, not so bad, yet. Hopefully it won’t get bad, we’ll see.

So now the question on my mind is, keep shooting and uploading to the current in the same amounts, spend less time on microstock, find new sited, start new site….on and on. Or just keep on back burner….

Decisions, decisions. Feel free to leave yours in the comments…

 

 

 

Only 7 days more of Singtel, I’ll have to suffer

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So my contracts have all finally expired and I have put in the calls, performed the necessary steps to cancel everything. I wanted to keep my phone numbers so I had then “ported” over to my new phone and internet carrier, Starhub. I chose Starhub because I re contracted the tv to a fibre optics plan and tacked everything onto that.

Starhub, by the way has a “go green” thing going on. The lobby of the shop I went to was paperless, they had a equipment recycle bin and go green signage. AWESOME.

Anyways, the porting process, when successful cancels the previous carriers account. So make sure your contract is expired. To cancel the home broadband (with included mobile broadband) you have to call Singtel. Here’s Singtel’s contact page. TAKE NOTE: if you’re looking to time things perfectly, Singtel will charge you $40 (what kind of bullshit is that?!?!?!) if you want your home broadband service immediately terminated. No charge if you wait 7 days (maybe so they can charge you one last month’s plan price? I wouldn’t be surprised). For mobile broadband, I was told the wait is 3 days. So time it right, good people, don’t give them any room to take any more of your hard earned money.

YAY for me! I’ll be free of Singtel and their predatory practices forever!!!!!!! If you wanna read about the issues I had with Singtel, it’s HERE and HERE.

Oh, the Singtel Rep asked me why I was cancelling, haha, I gave her a brief summary. She was indifferent until the part I told her that as a family we are all cancelling Singtel. In which she replied in a shocked tone, “oh, even the home line?” I said yes. After that, she couldn’t wait to get me off the phone, haha. Maybe  that gets them where it hurts. All that infrastructure of telephone lines they have to support with dwindling usage as the push to fibre optics increases.