2011 Redeemed Credit Targets

As an iStock contributor, your royalty rate for each calendar year is based on the total number of credits used by customers to download your files in the previous year. We call these "redeemed credits."

The tables below outline the redeemed credit targets for 2011 and their corresponding royalty rate. This will determine your starting/minimum royalty rate for next year (2012). If you reach a new level during 2011 you will immediately move up to a higher royalty rate, otherwise your current rate will remain in effect until the end of the year.

What are Redeemed Credits?

Your redeemed credits total represents all the credits that have been used by iStock customers downloading your files. It tracks the actual number of credits used in each download, depending on the file size, collection, and any extended license options.

Example: If you are a non-exclusive contributor and someone downloads an extra-small photo, your redeemed credit total will increase by 1. If they download an extra-large photo, your redeemed credit total will increase by 15.

Example: If you are an exclusive contributor and someone downloads an extra-large Vetta photo, your redeemed credit total will increase by 100.

There is a field on the "Stats" tab of your private profile page that shows your current total number of redeemed credits for the year. This number represents the total number of credits that have been used to download your files since January 1.

Example: If you are an exclusive photo contributor and have 42,000 redeemed photo credits at the end of 2011, your starting royalty rate on January 1, 2012 will be 35%. Remember: this is just your starting rate for the year.

If your redeemed credit total passes a higher target for the upcoming year before the end of the year, your royalty will increase. For example, if you started 2011 at 35%, and reach the 2012 redeemed credit level for 40% during course of 2011, you will immediately move to the higher rate.

You will have a different redeemed credit total for each of the different file types you upload to iStock. Illustration and Flash contributors will have their own royalty rate levels separate from photos.

Example: If you are an exclusive contributor who uploads both photographs and illustrations, you will now have a different royalty rate for each file type. If your 2011 redeemed credit totals are 20,000 for photographs and 10,000 for illustrations, you will begin the year earning 30% on photographs and 25% on illustrations in 2012.

Example: If you are an exclusive audio contributor and your 2011 redeemed credit total is 25,000, you will begin 2012 earning 35% on all audio downloads.