A number of marketplaces ask contributors to list work exclusively with them, or pay a higher rate if you do. We do not do this, and we want to explain why rather than just leaving it as a line in the terms.
Your work, your call
An exclusivity requirement makes sense for a platform that is offering something in return — a guaranteed audience, a marketing push, a salary. We offer none of those things. What we offer is a straightforward split: every sale returns 50% of the credit value to the artist, credits are priced at €0.15 each, and buyers in other currencies pay the equivalent converted at the live exchange rate at the time of purchase. That is a fair arrangement, but it is not the kind of arrangement that earns the right to tell you where else you can or cannot sell.
If you have built a following on another platform, or you sell prints directly, or you list on three other sites — none of that is our business. Restricting you would cost you income and give you nothing back.
How the economics actually work here
Picster runs on one-time credit top-ups. Buyers purchase credits when they need them and spend them on downloads; there is no subscription tying anyone to a monthly commitment. That model works better when the catalogue is genuinely good rather than artificially large, which is part of why we use a human-curated featured queue rather than an algorithm that rewards upload volume.
For contributors, the wallet system is straightforward:
- Credits from sales accumulate in your in-app wallet
- You request a payout yourself, on your schedule, from inside the app
- There is no minimum lock-in period waiting for a platform-triggered payment cycle
None of this depends on exclusivity. A buyer who finds your work here and buys a licence here generates the same 50% commission whether or not that same file is sitting on another site.
What we are actually asking of contributors
The one thing we do ask is that you only upload work you have the right to license — your own photography, your own illustrations, work where you hold the necessary model and property releases if they apply. That is the actual standard that matters to buyers and to us.
Beyond that, list your work wherever makes sense for you. If Picster becomes a useful part of your income, good. If it is one of several places where occasional sales come in, that is fine too. We would rather be honest about what we are — a small, independently run marketplace with a straightforward fee structure — than overstate our position in your business.
