CanStockPhoto ceasing operations

News
#1

Interesting that they are closing and not being acquired. Another casualty on the race to the bottom. This is from the email they sent out to contributors.

Unfortunately, due to a changing business landscape, Can Stock Photo will cease operations on October 1, 2023.

After nearly 20 years in business we have been forced to make this very difficult decision and would like to thank our many thousands of talented contributors and customers for making it possible. The industry has changed significantly over this time, with CanStock launched in 2004 during the early mass adoption of digital cameras, and before ā€˜social mediaā€™ was even a phrase. Today of course everyone has a capable digital camera in their pocket, and the advent of AI means amazing images can be created for free from programs with just a few keywords. Decreased business and increasing costs has made it no longer possible to keep operating, to our great disappointment.

Accordingly, notice is given that all membership agreements are terminated on October 1, 2023. Downloads and new orders will be disabled on October 1st. Active customer accounts may use their remaining credits and subscriptions up until then.

Credits in accounts that have not been active for one year prior to this notice are cancelled in accordance with the membership agreement, without refund or reimbursement.

Customers with unused credits or unfinished subscriptions purchased by credit card in the last 180 days or by check/wire, can request a prorated refund of $5 USD or more by logging into the site and filing a request here. The deadline to request a refund is on or before September 30, 2023. Please allow up to three weeks for refunds to be issued.

For contributors, to request a final payment, contributors must log on to their ā€œConvert Earningsā€ page and enter their payment information. Payments of $5 USD or more will be processed for account balances as of October 1st, for eligible accounts, who have submitted a request. Payments may take several months, but we anticipate they will be sent by December 31, 2023. The deadline to submit your payment request is September 30th.

#2

Now if only Alamy would do the sameā€¦

Not sure how much I believe the 'digital camera in their pocket" and the start of AI as a reason to toss in the towel. Pro grade stock photos will always be a needed resource regardless of those two events. I havenā€™t used Canstock for probably a decade. Maybe more. I initially had issues with the whole credit system for images where I only needed to by ONE image for a project and didnā€™t need to buy credits for 3.5 images. I migrated to sites that let me get just one easily and without hassle.
Subscriptions arenā€™t even an option.

#3

Funny. I had never seen this agency advertised or even heard of them before this post.

#4

Same here. Maybe if they had used the advertising services of some of their customers to promote themselves a little better, they wouldnā€™t be going out of business.

#5

180,000 contributors. Iā€™ve had my stock on there for 8 years and have only earned $2 in royalties, which still isnā€™t enough for a payout, so it looks like they are going to keep it.

FYI, here are the top 30 agencies according to Microstock Group, a large forum for stock contributors:

The big 4 are: AdobeStock, iStock, Shutterstock, Alamy

Then everyone else: GettyImages, Stocksy, Canva, Vecteezy, Pond5, Dreamstime, Bigstockphoto, Canstockphoto, Envato, DepositPhotos, 123RF, PantherMedia, Zoonar, MostPhotos, ColourBox, Pixta, YayImages, ClipDealer, 500px, MotionElements, Indivstock, Dissolve, ScanStockPhoto, EyeEm, VectorStock, storyblocks, PicFair

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