Shutterstock

Shutterstock was founded in 2003 by American entrepreneur and computer programmer Jon Oringer.[18] Creating his own online marketplace,[4] Oringer initially uploaded 30,000 of his own stock photos and made them available via subscription,[4] with unlimited downloads and a monthly starting fee of US$49.[4] When demand exceeded his photo supply,[4] he began hiring additional contributors.[19][4] In 2006, the firm claimed that it was the "largest subscription-based stock photo agency in the world" with 570,000 images in its collection.[20] The firm branched into film in 2006 with the launch of Shutterstock Footage. ,[20] By 2007, the company had 1.8 million photos.[8] Insight Venture Partners invested in the company that year.[4] Shutterstock expanded beyond subscriptions into a la carte pricing in August 2008, with its "On Demand" service removing daily download limits.[9]

On September 23, 2009, Shutterstock announced that it had purchased Bigstock, a rival credit-based microstock photography agency.[12] Fast Company argued the deal put "Shutterstock on a competitive playing field with Getty, whose iStockPhoto is also credit-based."[21] Shutterstock had 11 million royalty-free stock images by early 2010.[22] In February 2011, it announced a two-year partnership with the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) [23]

By April 2012 the company had 18 million royalty-free stock images,.[22][24] The firm announced the Shutterstock Instant tool in May 2012, which displayed images in an interlocking mosaic to increase viewing speed.[25] The product was launched by the newly formed Shutterstock Labs, which develops tools and interfaces for Shutterstock, among other projects.[25][26] In May 2012, Shutterstock filed for an initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange, which it completed on October 17, 2012 under the ticker SSTK.[10][11]

Shutterstock, Inc. announced Spectrum, a new "image discovery tool," in March 2013.[26] At the time, the firm had 24 million licensable photos, vectors and illustrations in its portfolio.[26] In August 2013, Shutterstock and Facebook announced a partnership to integrate Shutterstock's library within Facebook's Ad Creator, allowing advertisers to select from Shutterstock's images when creating ads.[27] At the time, Shutterstock was available in 20 languages including Thai, Korean, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, German, Russian, Chinese, and Japanese.[28]

In September 2013, Shutterstock launched Offset, marketplace prioritizing high end curated photos from established artists.[29] In October 2013, the firm stated it served 750,000 customers, with 30 percent of those customers in Europe.[30] Shutterstock's shares had reached a $2.5 billion market value by the fall of 2013,[4] while revenue for 2013 was US$235 million.[31]

In March 2014, Shutterstock acquired Webdam, a provider of online digital asset management software.[13] In May 2014, the firm partnered with Salesforce to integrate Shutterstock's image library into Salesforce's Social Studio.[32] Shutterstock debuted its Palette tool in July 2014, a "multi-color image discovery tool."[33] The firm announced it had surpassed 2 million video clips on September 2, 2014.[34] Shortly afterwards it revealed a new app meant to help contributors with uploading and categorizing photos.[35] Shutterstock's revenue was $328 million in 2014, an increase of 39 percent from 2013.[18] In 2014, Shutterstock paid "over $83 million to its roughly 80,000 contributors."[18]

In January 2015, Shutterstock acquired both Rex Features, Europe's largest independent photo press agency for $33 million,[36] and PremiumBeat, a stock music and sound effects service, for $32 million.[14] Penske Media Corporation formed a partnership with Shutterstock in June 2015 to create and license entertainment and fashion images. According to the terms of the deal, by 2016 Shutterstock would have an exclusive right and license to PMC's archive,[16] which included magazines such as Variety, Women's Wear Daily,[36] and Deadline.[18] Crain's wrote that with the partnership, "Shutterstock, a provider of stock imagery and music tracks, is stepping into the world of red carpets and fashion runways—and taking a key provider of fashion and entertainment photos and video away from archrival Getty Images.".[36] The company also acquired BEImages, another largest independent photo press agency.

By March 2016, the company had "over 100,000 contributors," with around 70 million images and 4 million video clips available for licensing and sale.[7] That month Shutterstock announced it would be distributing material from the Associated Press in the United States, with the deal to last 3 years and cover 30 million photos and around 2 million videos. The photos were expected to go live in April.[7] According to Entrepreneur, Shutterstock also had an "active customer base of 1.4 million people in 150 countries."[17]

In July 2016, Shutterstock revealed a partnership with Google advertising products including AdSense, AdWords, and AdMob.[37] The integration allows marketers creating Google ads to directly access Shutterstock images and track ad performance via the Shutterstock API.[38] In October 2016, the firm announced a distribution deal with the European Pressphoto Agency.[39]

In February 2018, Shutterstock invested $15 million into China based ZCool,[40] building on the operational relationship the two firms have had since 2014 when ZCool first became the exclusive distributor of Shutterstock creative content in China.[40][41] Webdam, which Shutterstock itself acquired back in 2014, was sold to Amsterdam-based Bynder for $49.1 million to move Shutterstock's strategy away from digital asset management.[42] Shutterstock later enter into a partnership with Tencent Social Ads, the online advertising subsidiary of Tencent.[41]

In May 2018, IBM's Watson Content Hub, a content management system (CMS) for marketers to create content using the IBM Watson AI search tool,[43] announced its partnership with Shutterstock,beginning July, 2018.[44]

In May 2020, the company announced that it will update its contributor earnings structure as of June 1, from a minimum flat-rate to a percentage-based model. Contributor income may be reduced from the previous minimum payment per downloaded image of 25 cents to 10 cents, or 15 percent of sales, at the entry level, with author ratings reset to zero at the beginning of each year.[45]

In September 2019, engineers at Shutterstock began designing a system to censor results displayed to users with IP addresses in China, with the system being implemented in October 2019.[41] The system returns no results in response to queries such as "President Xi", "Chairman Mao", "Taiwan flag", "dictator" or "yellow umbrella".[41]

The company has a history of aggressive marketing practices including misleading pricing, free trial offers with hidden fees, cumbersome switch of automatic subscription renewal as well as the cancellation of the subscription itself. Because of these practices many consider shutterstock to be a scam [52], [53].

At the moment, the company has chosen a business strategy of deceiving authors, as a result of which their income may be significantly reduced, and companies will increase at their expense in the short term, which will make cooperation with such a company unprofitable. Previously, the minimum payment for the downloaded image was 25 cents, now 10, or 15 percent of all sales for the entry level and zeroing the author's rating since the beginning of the year. These innovations have provoked the mass removal of portfolios of images and videos from the Shutterstock site.

Shutterstock began selling stock video in February 2006. Shutterstock Footage operates similarly to their image library, offering video clips by subscription or on a per-clip basis.[20] As of 2014, Shutterstock Footage contained around 2 million royalty-free video clips.[34] Shutterstock Music debuted later, with new content submittable by contributors.[54]

Shutterstock for iPad was launched in November 2011,[55] and in May 2012 the app received a Webby Award for People's Voice in the tablet app category for utilities and services.[56] Shutterstock for iPad was followed in 2012 by a universal iOS app,[57] which by 2013 had been downloaded 650,000 times. The iOS app originally lacked the ability to download images, with that functionality added later.[58] The universal iOS app also included new features for Shutterstock, including the ability to filter image searches by color.[57] Shutterstock debuted an Android App in 2013,[58] and in September 2014, Shutterstock launched an app dedicated to its contributors, both available for iOS and Android. The app allows contributors to upload, keyword and categorize new images.[35]

In 2012, Shutterstock launched Shutterstock Labs, a lab for "exploratory tools and products."[26] In May 2012, Shutterstock Images LLC announced the Shutterstock Instant tool, which according to the company was inspired by Shutterstock for iPad. The interface displays images in an interlocking mosaic view, allowing users to view more photos in less time.[25] Shutterstock Instant was made available on the Shutterstock Labs website.[25][26] The prototype for the search tool Spectrum was launched on March 21, 2013. With development in-house by Shutterstock Labs, the tool "indexes hexagram data to yield search results by color."[26] In July 2014, Shutterstock launched Palette, which allows users to add colors to the terms of the search, in addition to keywords.[33]

Shutterstock has developed a number of tools utilizing a "convolutional neural network" that it created[17] to help with reverse image search technology.[59] The network is "essentially a computer system that is trained to recognize images – there are millions of specific items such as cats, bicycles, the night sky – and pull up the most relevant photos." It "breaks down the key components of a photo numerically, drawing from its pixel data instead of metadata that is pulled from those tags and keywords."[17]

In March 2016, Shutterstock debuted its Reverse Image Search tool. According to Entrepreneur, with the tool "users can upload an image, either from Shutterstock or another source, and the tool will call up images that look like and have a similar feel to the original photo."[17] The reverse image search allows users to not just search by keywords, but to also find images based on "color schemes, mood, or shapes."[59] Later that month, the firm debuted its Similar Search and Discovery tools,[17] with the "similar search" option provided beneath photos on its website.[59]