Limits on Number of Assets In Review Now in Place

[Jill_C]

Announced by Raul Ceron on the Adobe Stock Contributors Discord channel this morning: 

"As some of you may have noticed already, we have established some limits to the number of assets you can have pending moderation at once. If you reach that limit, you will have to wait until the moderation process is complete for your files before being able to submit new assets for consideration. We hope this will unclog the moderation queue and result in better waiting times from now on. The maximum number of assets you can have waiting for moderation will depend on several factors and will be adapted to the global queue. Thanks for your understanding and patience."

[Jill_C · Accepted solution]

They did NOT announce what those limits are, but I suppose that knowledge will be revealed by Contributors over the coming days and weeks as they bump up against those limits.

[George_F]

It's interesting that it's an adaptive queue, although it makes sense after thinking about it.  Hopefully this helps lessen the wait time for everyone involved.  

[Abambo]

Adaptive can be simple, like the global number of assets waiting for moderation and the number of submitters. There is no need to adjust more than that.  I suppose they take in account the daily number of submissions and the daily moderation capacity. That will give you a nice number, where you can still add magic numbers to keep the queue in a stable state of 5 to 10 days of moderation time.

[Nancy OShea]

Thanks for posting this. It's good to see Adobe Stock is adopting corrective measures.

I imagine the adaptive limit might depend on several factors  -- type of assets, acceptance rate, sales history, etc..

[andréf50406820]

I imagine the adaptive limit might depend on several factors  -- type of assets, acceptance rate, sales history, etc..

By @Nancy OShea

That would be cool and you could do a lot with acceptance rate or sales history but looking at their other (very pragmatic) solutions for contributors I kinda doubt it. They had to roll it out as a hotfix with little time so most likely its just the global queue and then MAYBE some soft factors like age of account or acceptance rate. Most likely they set some internal time frame of like 10 days and then when global queue goes above that they adjust the max number. 

This surely helps the waiting times but I'm not sure if this is the right approach. Because who reaches high numbers? Generative AI people who know the rules and have a proper workflow to release high numbers (and spammers but they are easy to detect). I know you guys say that high numbers equal bad quality or duplicate content but it really isn't. You could grind 8 hrs / day and handpick 1000 high quality images easily that have a rejection rate of almost 0%. And people who do this know Adobe's portfolio well and generate stuff that is needed and that sells.

Now who are the people who don't get affected by this limit? The ones that "heard about midjourney" and now try to make some money on Adobe Stock. The ones that submit 30 images of "a robot in a futuristic city" and then after 24 hours ask in the forum why their pictures aren't live yet and if it's a problem that it's tagged as "photo" instead of "illustration".

So I don't know... I would look at people who don't even check their images but instead let Adobe do the culling (ok you kinda deal with that now). Then maybe do some stricter pre-filtering with Sensei so similiar content doesn't clock up the review process (if you need more animals in suits you can adjust the filter in the future). And 3rd maybe increase the bureaucratic obstacles for new users. Make tax forms mandatory, let them sign property releases or just overall increase the queue times (or decrease q max) for new users. Check if they're really interested in generative AI and make clear that it's not some Discord meme but actual business and taxes. If they have a small queue in the first 45 days they'll learn how to handpick. Same for the all-out-spammers who haven't seen their own images before.

tldr: a hard cap on good images is suboptimal if you want to sell images.

[Nancy OShea]

Of course, this is all speculation.  We don't know if the imposed limits will apply to all assets or just Generative AI.  We'll have to wait & see how it plays out.  Anything that can minimize long wait queues is better than nothing. 

[Test Screen Name]

I think we can be sure Adobe will not share details of how their process will work. I think they acutely aware that some submittors will use such details to try and "game" the system.

[Jill_C]

Exactly. AI "Artists" are already flooding the Discord channel hoping to garner some information to give them an edge...

[IndigoTides]

Everybody who competitively sells images is looking for an edge, I doubt AI artists are special in that regard. Additionally, not every AI creator types in a few prompts and uploads their images within minutes as it seems commonly assumed, some of us spend a lot of time editing, correcting, altering and adjusting images to look clean and to reflect our aesthetic. We're no different than any other derivative artist, so this general frustration I see geared toward us is misdirected. It will calm down soon enough and be business as usual in the review department.

[Jill_C]

Yes, I agree. The "Gold Rush" mentality will fade, and those who can't or don't want to put in the effort to perfect the images will fade away after getting a bunch of rejections. Same with fledgling photographers; when they discover that they can't just upload unedited snaps from their iPhones, they move on...

[Nancy OShea]

this general frustration I see geared toward us is misdirected.

By @IndigoTides

========

I've seen amazing artwork from very talented AI artists on other platforms. What we see posted in THIS community has fallen short of that because we only see the rejections. If we're slanted more in one direction than the other, that's why.

[Abambo]

Additionally, not every AI creator types in a few prompts and uploads their images within minutes as it seems commonly assumed, some of us spend a lot of time editing, correcting, altering and adjusting images to look clean and to reflect our aesthetic.

By @IndigoTides

I doubt that those submitting thousands of assets for moderation in a short time have invested time to correct their images. The limit is to target those people. Not the ones submitting 5 assets per day and waiting two months to get feedback.

And then, there are those smart guys, trying to short circuit the system and submitting their assets into the wrong queue. They will get probably in serious trouble, as well as those guys getting a lot more than 50% refusals. Moderation costs money, and after the first 100 assets, you should have a good acceptance rate. Mine (for photographs and vector) is near to 100%.

[Nancy OShea]

The standard everyone should aspire to is quality vs quantity. 

Success is based on how many assets get sold, not how many assets are submitted.

[Naige28933759vj2u]

Hi Jill,

Thanks for your information! 

I do found that Adobe takes long long time to review my images now. I don't upload tons of images per day. Normally 10 per day. Some are real photos took by myself and some generated by AI tools and I edit them carefully and marked AI images to illustration and in description, and put into keywords as well. But some of them already took 14 days and there is no reply. I don’t know where is the problem...Does Adobe have a rules for that. How many images should I upload and how many days should wait? 

[Jill_C]

It is clear that Adobe is now segregating Illustrations, including Generative AI assets, into a queue separate from photographs and videos. That queue has now grown so huge that the wait for review is now 1.5-2 months. Your photographs should still be getting reviewed in less than a week. Is that what you've experienced? If I were you, I would just concentrate your energies on editing, titling, keywording and uploading photographs! 

[Naige28933759vj2u]

I do agree 😜   I still have a big space to improve my phtographing and editing skill. Adeobe rejected quite a lot of my photos. Although shutter stock, getty images took all of them. 500PX rejected some of my photos but still took much more that Adobe. I was a little bit  frustrating with that. I know I am not a experienced photographer, but I did review photos carefully and that took a lot of times...Hope I can improve more and have more photos proved by Adobe 🙂

Thank you for your advice and have a great day!

Naige

[Nancy OShea]

You should wait as long as it takes.

5  - 15 days for photos & vectors.

1  - 2 months for generative AI & illustrations.

In the meantime, work on other things.

[Naige28933759vj2u]

You are right 😄  In the meantime, better just forget it and take more good quality photos  😉

Thank you!

Have a great day!

Naige

[Abambo]

The current limit we have: 481 or less. 😉

[Jill_C]

I've read on the Discord channel of some contributors having maxed out at a few thousand, but I suppose it's possible that they already thousands in the queue when the cap was put in place...

[Abambo]

I've read on the Discord channel of some contributors having maxed out at a few thousand, but I suppose it's possible that they already thousands in the queue when the cap was put in place...

By @Jill_C

That's most probable. I also suspect that this user was maxed out when they put the cap in place. I suspect the cap being much smaller.

[sixhaunt · Accepted solution]

mine is 3,001 and has been for quite some time. A friend of mine started more recently and has a cap of only 501 though

[Jill_C]

Another contributor recently reported a limit of only 50.

[Test Screen Name]

It seems that Adobe now have limits that adapt to the supplier. It would make sense if they prioritize profitable suppliers. I would expect that people who treat endless rejections as a learning opportunity, or who hope to just submit thousands in the hope that some will get through, will find themselves at a disadvantage. (All is speculation: Adobe are silent, rightly in my view).