August updates:

Well, August was really slow for me (and many others, judging by the forums) so I haven't rushed to post my figures. Vacation time, Summer Slowdown, call it what you will but this is what I scraped in:
Shutterstock produced 46 downloads ($11.50). Dreamstime 10 downloads ($9.85). Istock had 1 regular sale at $ 1.77 and 3 partner sales totalling $0.75.
Bigstock showed some life with 2 downloads ($3). And, finally, a pleasing high res sale at Yaymicro netted 5euros.
Nothing in August from Picturenation, Mostphotos or 123RF.

I have had images live at 123 for nearly five months now and not even a little subscription sale. I really hope they can build the marketing for their Editorial images as I know many (non editorial) contributors get regular sales there. One was kind enough to send me a screen shot of his earnings page recently. It was nice to see something other than a page of zeros.

However, not all bad news - I had the last of my "Dash For Cash" submissions reviewed at Veer and was pleased to find I had earned $74 bonus from them. This was double what I was expecting as I had forgotten that the bonus went up from $0.35 to $0.70 if you got more than 100 images accepted. I'd had 106! Now I just need $26 in actual sales to reach payout.
Regards, David.

From Woohaying to No Waying (Istock in turmoil):

Well, I was about to post some stats for August when Microstock events overtook me. Istockphoto announced major commission changes (cuts) from next January. Instead of your commission rate being set by your "cannister" level (based on all time sales) it will now be based only on sales from the previous year. For small and independent contributors (like myself) commission will drop from an already poor 20% to what I believe to be an industry low of 15%. Even many of the successful exclusive contributors are anticipating a drop in earnings. Not surprisingly this has led to an outcry on the forums (link here:http://www.istockphoto.com/forum_messages.php?threadid=252322) with the main thread now running to over 3336 (mainly hostile) postings. Several statements by IS chief Kelly Thompson to justify the move seem, if anything, to have made matters worse with many posters cancelling their exclusive status and halting new uploads. Others are calling on image buyers to boycott IS. This is where it gets interesting because IS seems to have overlooked the fact that many contributors are also buyers in their "day job". An increasing number are now posting that they and their companies will not buy images from IS again.
Istock are part of Getty images who are owned by equity group Hellman and
Friedman. This whole move looks like an attempt to up profits (possibly before a sell off, as some have speculated) and seems to have been done with complete disregard for loyal contributors. The so called Istock Community is fast looking like a thing of the past with many now posting four letter word abuse in the forums.
I should say, that none of this has much impact on me financially. I only have a small portfolio there and not many sales. But I do feel really sorry for those who rely on IS for a big part (or all) of their earnings and especially those making a full time living from stock. It remains to be seen how this all pans out in the coming weeks. Regards, David.