Did Yahoo sign a deal with Getty Images

Submitted by Patrick Grote on Sat, 01/20/2007 - 9:06pm.

An odd thing happened when I was looking at sports photos in Yahoo. The associated press and reuters photos disappeared. You can see for yourself that only Getty Images are shown. Typically, you would see a photo stream from associated press, reuters and Getty Images.

After poking around a little more, I did see where associated press and reuters photos still appear on Yahoo, but they are outside the normal photo stream.

I sent an email to the Yahoo help folks, but haven't heard anything back yet. I know this change happened sometime between January 16, 2007 and January 19, 2007.

One would wonder why Yahoo has made this change. I think they are three reasons:

1) Deal with Getty Images: Maybe Yahoo has made a deal with Getty Images to only show their photos in the sports photo stream. I searched Google News for any articles on this deal, but didn't see anything. The Yahoo press release page shows nothing either.

2) Rights issue with AP and Reuters: Yahoo's rights deal might have expired with the associated press and reuters. They still show up in the galleries, but maybe it was more money for them to show up in the sports photo stream. I checked the associated press site for press releases, but nothing was found.

3) A Yahoo software bug: This is probably the reason why. It's the easiest and the most obvious. Something happened in the way associated press and reuters photos are tossed into the photo stream. Somehow the naming convention, labels or something else changed in the photos, so Yahoo isn't picking them up.

It's a little frustrating not hearing anything from Yahoo when you report an issue. Hopefully, someone will get back and let me know what's happening.