PhotoShelter is beefing up its executive ranks with new hires from AMEX and Getty Images.
(Credit: PhotoShelter)While Getty Images continues to look around for someone to buy them, the rising Internet-based stock image house PhotoShelter today announced that it has hired two new executives, one of which it hired away from Getty. When it launched its stock image business called the PhotoShelter Collection late last year, the company promised to invest $1 million toward promoting the Collection's images among buyers of stock photography. As part of this effort, the company has hired former American Express Senior Product Manager Andrew Fingerman to be PhotoShelter's new vice president of marketing, and Getty Images' former market development executive Genevieve Harley as the PhotoShelter's new director of sales.
PhotoShelter's history with Getty has been slightly rocky. Having started their stock business at a time when Getty was feeling heavy pressure from microstock sites, PhotoShelter offered a new model for stock photography sales with a much larger percentage of sales going to the photographers themselves. At the time, Getty had made a drastic cut in prices for all its stock images, offering them all for $49 for online use, while keeping the percentage going to photographers the same. That decision angered many of the company's photographers, and Getty modified its pricing plan again. However, many photographers were still less than pleased. Given Getty's tumultuous situation, you have to wonder if Ms. Harley's departure marks the beginning of a coming exodus as the company's employees prepare for tough times at the photo giant.
Getty Images, one of the biggest stock-photo houses, has launched a music licensing business designed to give broadcasters, movie makers and advertisers quick access to songs.
The commercial service was built with the help of Pump Audio, which Getty acquired in June. The music unit is only the start for Getty, which plans to expand the kind of content it offers.
The service will start with 20,000 original tracks by independent artists, the company said in a statement Monday. That number is tiny when compared with music libraries offered by consumer services.
For example, iTunes now boasts more than 6 million songs. Even tiny SpiralFrog, which launched its music site last month with songs from only one of the four major record labels, has about 800,000 songs.
Getty said in a statement that the company intends to partner with major record labels and publishers.
Getty Images, which made a name for itself as a stock photography clearinghouse, announced Wednesday it has purchased Pump Audio, which licenses independent music to advertising and media clients. The price of the acquisition, according to a release from Getty, was $42 million.
This is the most recent in a series of moves on Getty's part to expand beyond photography and into the digital media sector. Last month, it launched a new division in the company to license video footage and other multimedia content, and over the past few months has chalked up a string of acquisitions, from amateur photography site Scoopt to smaller competitors . The Pump Audio buy, however, marks Getty's first foray into music licensing.
For Pump Audio, which made a splash at last year's OnHollywood conference, the acquisition means that the start-up now has the keys to unlock a much broader sphere of influence. "The combination with Getty Images will give many more creative customers access to great original music," said Steve Ellis, the company's founder and CEO, "and at the same time will provide our contributing artists access to a huge, global marketplace."
(Credit:
Wikipedia)
iStockphoto, an online subsidiary of stock-art seller Getty Images, is taking its business to consumers. The company typically sells images to newspapers, ad agencies and others with a large appetite for photos and illustrations, but on Wednesday it announced a partnership with Amuse Entertainment Group to let ordinary folks download images to use as mobile phone wallpaper.
The companies began a pilot phase of the project in the United Kingdom. Subscribers using the Orange, O2, T-Mobile, 3, Virgin Mobile and Vodafone networks will be able to download images beginning in April.
The pilot could be expanded to the United States and Canada. A second phase will make the image library available worldwide.
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