Oh, so we are all still here... well, why not?
A little lateral thinking from me today.
Basically, my 'beef' with Flickr et al, is I do not like giving a third party any uncontrolled control over my photography or my thoughts. They are uniquely mine, I take responsibility for them - and I prefer to retain my ownership to them.
I never considered Flickr or almost all the 'business' image sites. A few I seriously considered, but decided no. As ko-fe has so aptly written, almost all were (and still are) 'dumpsters' for bad photography. Nobody I know (including me) has ever made a sale from anything they posted on Flickr, it's too much of a rubbish tip of mostly bad photography. Some good, very little of it is, all lost in the mass of dross.
A few decades ago I did one of the early photo sites - no name, it's the one named after an item many fishermen use. Same problem. Too many photos posted, too much crap. Buyers didn't like it and stayed away from the site.
For six years I had my own small stock photo web site. I 'specialise' in a some areas of photography not many do, so I had (still have) markets for my images. The $$ was okay, not enough to live on, but not pocket money either, as so many amateurs I know make with $5 or even 50 cent bottom-feed sales.
I took the basic precaution of making my site password-protected, login only. This was not easy back then. I searched until I found an ISP offering this. To view my folders you had to email me, reply to a (brief) questionnaire and give one reference, usually a web site if you or your company had one.
Nine out of ten queries were from browsers who made the mistake of listing all the sites where they had posted work. Having identified them as time-wasters, I declined their request. A few turned nasty. Most disappeared.
The remaining one in ten was a legitimate publisher/media agency who came, browsed and often bought an image or even a series. All paid promptly and I got repeat sales over the years. Nice and easy, it was.
Not really. For all success it was a lot of work. In the 'mid-10s stock markets declined as amateurs desperate to see their work published flooded the 'net with free photos. I saw the inevitable happening, bowed out of the scene and closed my site.
To me Flickr, Instagram and the like are places mostly for the socially needy who want little pats on the head. Ego-gratification is not a strong motivation for me, so I pass.
My partner now and then logs into IG and Facebook. I sigh and bite my tongue. Last week I had my attention drawn to one "communication" there. "Hi, how are you?" "Oh, I'm home tonight, cutting my toenails."
Back to photography.
What all this boils down to is that it really all depends on what one wants to get from posting one's images, and just as important, how much time effort one is prepared to commit to get it.
That's all from me. Much too long a post, as usual. Anyway.
