I had a job working for this bunch of goons once and they sacked me because of the ‘current climate’. Most jumped up bunch of arrogant pr1cks I’ve ever come across in my life.

If this is what people are like ‘at the top of their game’, I’m happy to sit out a few rounds.

Disgusting.

Well said.

Furthermore, crowdsourcing is especially damaging to designers because once an idea is published, there is no way to get it back. If my submission loses, there is nothing to prevent the client from borrowing several of my design ideas and integrating them into their final piece.

Years ago when croudsourcing was in its infancy, I wanted to build up my portfolio because I was new to the field. One of the contests I entered was canceled by the client. Outrageous. Several of the submissions were outstanding.

While this example exposes an unethical client, it also illuminates the innate problem with these contests: the client isn’t getting one design at a discount, they are getting 25 designs. I don’t see why a professional designer would participate in this process.

If students and amateurs want to learn their trade by dabbling in design, then I suppose that’s fine. You could use croudsourcing as a means to build up an inadequate portfolio. But I would warn a professional designer to avoid this venue.

By your reckoning, and please excuse me if I’m wrong, it’s okay to promote, encourage, and earn a living off other people doing spec work (what companies like 99designs and Crowdspring do), but not okay to make use of such a service (as BBH did).

I consider the whole concept of spec work unethical.

There have been quite a few student designers (and designers new to the field) thank me after reading blog posts about spec work. They hadn’t previously thought too hard about how it devalues their work. There are so many better uses of a designer’s time than working for free, in the mere hope of getting paid.

Amanda,

You haven’t waffled at all, and pick up on a vital point worth reiterating — once someone works on a contest submission, and loses, all that time spent on the project has gone to waste because the outcome has been tailored specifically to one company (as all effective design projects are).

Given that on Crowdspring, for every single contest “winner” there are a minimum of 24 losers it makes sense for a submitter to create as many designs as they can, in as short a timeframe as possible, improving their chances of “winning”. That’s one reason why we see a lot of ripped-off logos entered.

It’s a numbers game.

So not only is it a lottery for the person submitting work, but it’s also a lottery for the person holding the contest. Will they choose a design that infringes on copyright, leaving them open to legal proceedings? Hopefully not, but it happens, and you only need to visit spec website forums to learn from companies it’s happened to.

Granted not all people who submit entries are rip-off artists, which is why these contests are exceptionally unfair to those honest designers who unwittingly take part.

Who it exploits is novice designers who want to make a freelance living from their craft and haven’t realised yet that spec work is harmful to those aspirations.

I’m aware that it’s each individual designers choice to make as to whether to do spec work or not, but it’s a shame for those novice designers doing it thinking it’s a good move for their freelance career, when it’s not at all.

So in that respect they are being misled and that’s when it starts to feel a bit unethical overall.

I personally feel that anyone who encourages a designer to do spec work isn’t entirely ethical in their behavior – how can anyone feel it ethical to encourage someone to spend time working on something with their unique skills even though they may not be paid for it?

Again, it’s the creatives choice, but I don’t think that makes it right to encourage people to make the wrong choices in life for their career.

I think it quite bizzare that this culture has arisen at all in the design world, when it doesn’t exist in any other industry does it?

For instance we don’t have websites where we go to get hundreds of professional writers to submit an article for us based on our specifications of what we want written and then we pick our favorite. Unfortunately the rest don’t get paid for their writing.

Or a website where you go and ask for someone to hand craft you an outfit for a wedding, and then you pick the one you want the most. The rest unfortunately do not get paid for their dressmaking time and they may not be able to sell what they made for you… oh well tough luck for them.

I expect there are many cases where the designers aren’t being exploited or damaging their aspirations to have a freelance design career because some of them make a ‘job’ out of doing spec work day in day out, and will palm off old rejected designs to someone else at some point and thus will at some point be paid for most of their design time.

In that respect they know how to play the game and are probably making a good living. But there are many that aren’t making money in their ‘design career’ because they are doing spec work and haven’t yet figured out why that is.

I’ve waffled :)

But what about all of the other companies (not large international companies with their own design agency, like BBH) that simply are looking for someone to design their logo for them? Sure you don’t have a problem with them using a service like CrowdSpring to tap into thousands of creatives for a very low cost, right?

It’s the behaviour of Crowdspring that Amanda and I are referring to. For me, the spec model is unethical, but I’m also fully aware that opinions will differ.

However, keep in mind that there are people out there that enjoy designing not just for the money, but more for the forum to express themselves.

That’s a good summary of a specific point. There’ll always be choices, it’s just choosing the right one.

Sure it exploits the creatives, but then are they ‘really’ exploited? After all they can choose ‘not’ to involve themselves in such websites as Crowdspring and be paid for every design work they create instead.

Choices, choices…

But then not everyone is wise and experienced, in which case a big agency chooses to use an environment/services which preys on the inexperienced designers of this world.

Tjeerd,

BBH has today published a follow-up report, and as far as I can tell, they’re not using any of the designs submitted (more than 1,700 in total), but instead, are going to work with one designer found through the contest.