Bruce Livingstone knows his way around the stock photography industry, and he’s doing his best to shake things up. After founding iStockphoto in 2000, he turned it into a microstock juggernaut, finally selling it to Getty Images in 2006 for a whopping $50 million. Now, as both Getty Images and iStockphoto are mired in a licensing controversy, Livingstone has a new stock photo business that may rock the boat even more.

It’s called Stocksy, and is a co-op for stock photographers who want to step out from under the shadow of giant stock photography companies.
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Here’s a big reason not to use stock images in a political ad campaign – the model’s “loyalty” can be bought.

According to BBC News, a witty public relations battle has sprung up between two opposing political parties in Northern Ireland, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) and the Ulster Conservatives and Unionists (UCU).

A designer for the UCU recognized the image of the woman on the DUP poster from a stock photo agency. He purchased another image of “Kristen” to run in a spoof advertisement, which says she had a change of heart. A UCU spokesperson then challenged the opposite party, asking them to verify which voter constituency in Northern Ireland the woman was from.

In spite of their PR predicament, the DUP responded, saying that the situation has only upped their publicity. There’s always a silver lining.

(via The Online Photographer)