Shutterstock

History

2023

Buying Giphy

On May 23, 2023, the American company Shutterstock announced the acquisition of Giphy, a service that allows users to search and share animated files in GIF format. Read more here.

Blocking in Russia

At the end of February 2023, Roskomnadzor blocked the Shutterstock photo bank. The exclusive representative of photo banks in Russia and the CIS - Fotodom agency - explained that access to the service is limited due to "the placement of material that does not meet the existing requirements."

According to Roskomsvoboda, two links leading to Shutterstock are blocked - both have the word "suicide" in their addresses. It is noted that the materials due to which Roskomnadzor limited the work of the site have already been deleted, so Fotodom is counting on the imminent resumption of the work of the photo bank in the Russian Federation.

Roskomnadzor limited access to the site because of photos in whose addresses there is the word "suicide"

The company added that by the end of February 2023, this is the second Shutterstock lock due to the presence of unsatisfactory materials. The first lockdown happened a few months ago, but the problem was quickly fixed.

According to Sostav, which was the first to pay attention to Shutterstock blocking, with the help of the service, designers and photographers around the world share their work for subsequent monetization. Therefore, many specialists in the creative industries use the site not only as a tool for work, but also as a platform for inspiration. Stock works according to the subscription model - the buyer buys a subscription, which gives him the right to download a certain number of items of content during the specified period. Authors receive a percentage of the sale. In Russia, the vast majority of advertising market players use Shutterstock services.

Shutterstock remained one of the few photo banks that continued to provide services to specialists in Russia after the start of the special operation of the Russian Federation in Ukraine. Fotodom said that the supplier will continue to work in the Russian Federation with the preservation of all licenses both based on Shutterstock materials and materials from other collections.^[1]

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