Identity designers should be sending out a BIG "thank you" to Megan Lane Patrick, Senior Editor of HOW magazine and HOW Books, for her HOW Blog post "How To Get A Crappy Logo."
Megan writes:
Offer a $320 "award" to anyone who can please you with their "design" of your logo. Oh, you'll get lots to choose from, but do would really want any of them? (Bad logos make my stomach hurt. Really!)
I'm in total agreement with Megan. Whether it's billed as a"contest," a project "bidding" site, the result is an "award," or the process is called crowdsourcing; a good percentage of the time the final product does a major disservice to the client by eliminating the interaction between a business owner and a creative professional. Seldom does the "designer" have the education and experience to justify taking on such a project - and it does show in the majority of designs submitted. The designer loses out, too - being taken advantage of by a procedure that is nothing but "spec work" in disguise.
Megan, thanks for simply saying what so many of us think on a regular basis!
© 2008 Jeff Fisher LogoMotives
1 comment:
Amen to that!
I'll go further to say that any true design professional should site this blog entry or HOW article to any person or organization trying to disguise spec work under the cloak of a "contest". It is shameful. It's logo design "spam". And if we uncover it and do nothing, that is the same as accepting this type of business practice. If we all raised our collective professional design voices in protest loud enough and often enough, eventually, perhaps, they'd start to think twice before tarnishing their organizations reputation by soliciting spec design work in this sneaky, degrading way.
You're right, Jeff. This issue rubs all professional designers the wrong way - and I'm so happy you brought it to light. Thank you!
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