but for continued discussion…

“why mobile phone photos only”
I would guess focusing on smartphone photos allows them to separate themselves from an already saturation micro stock market.  It makes them unique and gives some authenticity to their content.

— quote —
“And one problem was that if we found a good photo, a nice, face, the other travel agencies found the same one.”

The photos often didn’t strike the right tone — not localized enough for style or place — and she also found them boring: “It’s almost like they’re the same very well-styled photos, without a spontaneous feeling, without the natural look.”
— quote —

While they do apparently allow non-smartphone content, too much of it will make them just like other stock sites.  It will be interesting to see how much of that bleeds in.  A lot of the top rated stuff (not necessarily top selling) is clearly not from a smartphone.

“90% are bad snapshots with mediocre quality”
buyers are buyers.  obviously those who are buying are fine with the quality and “mediocre image quality”.  in fact maybe this will push smartphone shoots to push for better quality in their own images knowing they have the potential to easily sell them.

“so why not snapshots…. but at least with DSLR image quality?”
as above technically they will accept non-smartphone images but being that more users carry smartphones than dslrs on a regular basis it makes sense to tap that market and they can ramp up much faster and have access to a much larger constant stream of content.  Sure the keeper ratio is a lot lower but they are reviewing/approving and have lower standards than traditional micro stock so they are still reaping benefits.

What it really comes down to is that the camera doesn’t matter and the perceived quality is all in the eye of the buyer.  Those concerned about quality or hi-resolution uses will likely stick to traditional stock for the most part as opposed to sourcing from a smartphone based site.  Sometimes it just doesn’t matter what you shoot with.

i mean is there a market especially for crap photos?

i don´t say a mobile phone photo has to be bad…. but lets be honest and face the facts. 90% ARE bad snapshots with medicore image quality.

so why not snapshots…. but at least with DSLR image quality?

You guys at Fstoppers actually think this is OK?

What are you guys smoking’………?

B.4. GRANT OF LICENSE TO THE CONTENT
“…the Seller grants to the Buyer a non-exclusive, perpetual, world-wide and fully-paid right of use to the Content for any purpose, whether commercial or non-commercial, including the right to modify, reproduce, publish, display and sub-license the Content, and create derivative works thereof, in any manner (the “Content License”) ”

C.5. NO RIGHT FOR SELLER TO BE IDENTIFIED AS PHOTOGRAPHER
“…The Seller is aware and agrees that by granting a Content License under this User Agreement, the Seller waives all its rights to be identified or mentioned as photographer or copyright holder of the Content. Thus, the Buyer shall be free to use the Content in accordance with the Content License without mentioning the Seller. However, the Buyer shall not be entitled to state or otherwise indicate that the Buyer is the copyright holder of the Content, but may merely state that the Buyer uses the Content under license.”

source: http://foap.com/pages/terms