We’re announcing changes to the way contributors can restrict images for certain uses and how customers can license them.
From mid-August 2024, if you’re a contributor to Alamy, you’ll only be able to make your content available according to the following options:
- Editorial Only
- All Uses (both editorial and commercial)
Under these new license types, images will still be available for RM and RF licensing, but it won’t be possible to restrict images specifically and solely for Advertising & Promotion, Consumer Goods or Personal Use in any combination. The current Advertising & Promotion, Consumer Goods and Personal Use restrictions will be combined to be defined as ‘commercial use’.
Why are we introducing this change?
We’re always looking to find efficiencies in how we run the business, not only for staff, but also for contributors and customers alike. The stock photo industry is extremely competitive, and we’ve identified the need to adapt as a business to reflect the more simplified way customers want to use and license images today.
The main benefit of making the process more streamlined for all our customers is that having clearer terms will give them more confidence to license the images according to how they want to use them, therefore boosting conversion rates.
We believe that by introducing these changes and staying agile in the current marketplace will lead to more image sales and therefore a greater yearly revenue for our contributors and the business.
As a contributor what will this mean for my portfolio of images?
If your images are currently available under the following restrictions, we will automatically map your images to the new licensing model, and there is nothing more you need to do:
- Editorial Use Only – these will remain as Editorial Use Only
- Available for all uses (Editorial, Consumer Goods, Advertising & Promotion, Personal Use) – these will remain as being available for All Uses (both editorial and commercial)
- Available for Editorial Use but not Consumer Goods and/or Advertising & Promotion and/or Personal Use in any combination – we will move these to Editorial Use Only
If your images have restrictions in any other various combinations, we will remove these images temporarily from sale as part of the release, to ensure a swift conversion, and then email you to ask you to confirm how you want the new options for restrictions to be applied before we place the images back on sale.
What can I do now?
If you’re keen to ensure that the correct restrictions are applied on your account before the changes come into place and keep your images on sale, then we recommend that you go into your account now and update these restrictions yourself. Alternatively, you can email contributors@alamy.com to confirm if you’d like us to make these changes now.
We’d advise that you either lift all the restrictions (if your images are suitable for both commercial and editorial uses), or restrict your images to sell for Editorial Only uses.
Next steps and more information
This new licensing model is not something you can opt out of. When we introduce the changes, they will also be reflected in the Alamy Image Manager where you will only be able to restrict your images under one of the two options: Editorial Only or All Uses (both editorial and commercial).
As an effective way to raise any thoughts or concerns with this change, we’ve set up a thread on the contributor forum where we will read and respond to any comments posted here.
In supporting sustainable growth for the business and recognising the need to grow and develop the presence of Alamy in a very competitive marketplace, we hope you agree that these changes make a strong foundation for future growth that will benefit both contributors and customers in the long term.