My position on crowdsourcing is so on-the-fence that a stiff breeze in one direction or the other would send me toppling to either side.
On the one hand, it’s a brilliant way to engage fans/consumers/friends with your brand. Instead of pushing an internally generated idea, you invite participation in shaping its course. There are great examples this kind of thing, like this poster for Adidas and this site from HP. In fact, much of PFTA has been crowdsourced. The new logo, the guest posts, even Lemonade — these things would be impossible without the crowd (you) engaging with the brand (PFTA). In these instances, crowdsourcing = co-creation. Everyone is on board for the shot to be a part of something bigger.
So from that perspective, I should have no issues whatsoever.
On the other hand, I’m hanging on to my old (guard?) belief that a day’s work deserves a day’s wages. For every co-created group project, there are even more crowdsourcing contests, like Crispin’s much-criticized design competition for Brammo, and entire sites dedicated to getting creatives to compete for projects like Crowdspring and Zooppa. The argument against them is that if you really value creativity, writers and artists and designers (and any other skill there’s a demand for) won’t give away their talents for nothing.
Not to mention, this approach to crowdsourcing tends to generate what most advertising and design professionals consider terrible ideas.
I bring this debate to the table because over the past couple of months, I’ve received several requests from companies wanting to leverage PFTA’s talent pool. The reason I haven’t shared these requests with you is because they came with no promise of payment. The people who approached me said, “let’s use your talent and when we win the assignment we’ll reimburse them for their time.”
I don’t know about you, but I can’t just spend 15 minutes writing headlines and expect something great. Depending on the project, it could take days or weeks to do something that meets my own standards. So the opportunity cost of committing to a project without any reasonable assurance of reimbursement is just too high for me.
I haven’t broached crowdsourcing with you until now because I was acting like a den mother, trying to shield you from unfair labor practices. But I’m realizing now that it could just be me. I may have mistakenly projected my own reservations onto you. And since we’re all part of this community, I wanted to open(source) this for discussion.
So here’s my question: Would you be open to working on crowsourced projects? Is there a middle-ground you’d consider…say, half your rate until your idea is bought, then more after? What if you could bid on work before committing to doing it? Or say the client didn’t own the rights to your work unless they bought it…would the prospect of maintaining your own intellectual property be of value to you?
Or is there some crowdsourcing model (current or in your own brain) that would make participation more attractive to you?
I see how valuable crowdsourcing can be for creative expression, and especially for clients. But I also see how it can be used to demean what we have all chosen to do for a living. As James McMurtry wrote in the great song “Where’s Johnny”:
He saw both sides of everything and found he could not move.
I suspect this won’t be the last time I approach this topic with y’all. So with this post, I’m starting a crowdsourcing category.
Discuss.
19 Comments
Hey Erik,
One part of these situations I’ve always felt was lacking was limiting the size of the source pool. I can live with risking a week’s worth of work for nothing more than a tiny fee if I’m competing with 50 creatives, but not 5,000. Clients can set the limit wherever they want, but I need to know up front what it is so I can decide if the odds of getting my fee are worth putting in the time.
I’m right there with you Jim. From the talent’s standpoint, putting 80 hours of work into a project with little chance of payment isn’t financially viable for most. It’s different for agencies, who should be able to absorb a couple of unsuccessful pitches here and there without a huge impact on their bottom line. But for contractors living from project to project, a huge time commitment simply is an option without knowing there’s a check waiting for you at the end.
I feel that crowdsourcing is fine for non-profit, volunteer stuff. Think of it along the lines of pro-bono. I think it is very bad karma if a for-profit company seeks to get work this way. It instantly tells me this company doesn’t value creative work.
Valerie,
Either that, or they value participation. There are those who are just looking for free work, and there are those who are looking for involvement. I like to think of PFTA as being the latter.
For an excellent discussion on all things crowdsourcing, check out the comments on Edward Boches’ blog. Some really intelligent arguments on both sides of the issue:
http://edwardboches.com/did-cpb%E2%80%99s-crowdsourcing-experiment-backfire-have-designers-created-an-exclusive-club-designed-to-keep-newcomers-out
Just finished reading “Life Inc.” By Rushkoff. The book explores the use of the current corporatism and a central currency system that by nature is designed to suck creativity and work to the center wealth structure. It also explores a more local commerce/trade system where there is a fair exchange for work and service. So it seems to me that while I love the idea to collaborate with other creative people I’m more than concerned that all this talent in our current environment could get exploited to producing the best work for the lowest price. Benefiting a select few(Moneied corporate clients) while providing nominal project fees. Don’t have an answer but I am trying to figure out how to work
I don’t have an answer yet on this either — but I’m glad you’ve started the conversation.
Coincidentally, I was just reading about this topic on John Winsor’s blog. http://www.johnwinsor.com/my_weblog/2009/10/whats-crowdsourcing-have-to-do-with-it.html
He was criticizing an article in Forbes by Dan Woods “The Myth of Crowdsourcing” http://j.mp/2TTZuh and offered the notion that crowdsourcing innovation isn’t as black & white as Woods proposed– and that innovation is iterative..
More importantly, he suggested that the most successful crowds are led by some kind of dynamic leader that is able to solicit ideas from large communities and then shape them into something truly amazing..
Sound familiar Erik? I think so…
I am a huge fan of crowdsourcing as a way to stimulate participation and get fans mobilized behind a brand. I.e. You on You, from HP. Also, believe it’s an opportunity for emerging talent to get a shot at things. But if it exploits an unemployed group of creatives just to try and get ideas for cheap? That’s not quite cool. There is crowdsourcing that invites those who were already going to create anyway (think all the brands who get free content and parodies, etc. on YouTube) and there is pure exploitation. There are an awful lot of ways to do this. Some do it well; others not so well. Filmaka, for example does it with real respect for the creator. Given that the technology is here, that brands will want to source from a larger pool, and that anyone (I agree with Bogusky on this) can be creative, CS is here to stay. I guess it’s up to the individual whether he or she wants to play. You can call me a fence sitter on this aspect of it, I guess.
Crowdsourcing is just a fad. Why do I know this? Because very quickly, clients will realize they’d rather pay money to someone good and be done with it than to have to sift through 10,000 terrible concepts to find one semi-good one.
They think they’re saving money by only paying a pittance. In reality they’re simply going to spend way more in man-hours on their end.
That’s only one small part of crowdsourcing, Matt. What about those clients who want give people a say in shaping their brands? What about concepts that actually involve consumers? I keep returning to this very blog, PFTA’s beta site and Lemonade as my own personal examples. Brands that understand that it’s about more than getting cheap labor are the ones doing something exciting.
I was Jeff Howe’s original Wired Magazine poster child for what happens to traditional stock photographers when a crowdsourcing model comes into play.
When you bring the crowd into the photography world, fees drop and the number of full-time stock photography producers are dropping by the day.
In that model it’s bad for professional creators and gives a short term access to the market by talented amateurs. The other downside is that those talented amateurs are killing the future market that blocks them from turning pro.
One on the positive side I think that the Starbuck’s model of MyStarbucksIdea where they engage their customer’s for suggestions is a great idea.
Is that knocking a professional out of the picture as well?
I’ve been a fairly vocal opponent against crowdsourcing creative ever since it started taking off. I’m a huge supporter of the NoSpec movement (http://www.no-spec.com/) in design. This idea of using crowdsourcing to allow consumers to take part in shaping the brand isn’t usually what I run across, but I have to say if it’s not taking the place of professionally created work, but instead adding to it I’m all for it. However, the prevailing way of using crowdsourcing creative right now seems to be nothing more than an attempt to get the lowest possible price on ok work. With so many pros out of work, the quality of the work in these race to the bottom pitches is even increasing. I agree completely with Mark’s comment about the effects it’s had on stock photographers, as I’ve watched a similar trend happen in logo and small website design as well (the stuff that used to be the bread and butter of a freelance designer because it didn’t require weeks of commitment to complete.)
In theory, I’m all for companies using crowdsourcing as a way to allow customers to interact with their brand, but it seems the current focus is letting the customers take over creative duties on the brand to save paying professional rates. Where does that leave us?
I’d like the idea this all a lot more if it were framed as crowd feedback. If Microsoft launches say, a terrible new version of MS Word I’d like to know their ears are open for feed back. Actually, I’d have preferred that if before doing anything they started an open conversation with users about what they liked and didn’t – presented options and incorporated suggestions etc. I also like crowdsourcing for creating content within a community (saves PR people some grief).
But if we’re talking anything from a new logo to a campaign, I think it’s foolish to expect anyone (as you pointed out) to be able or willing to the resources to create a truly good product. Further, I think that without a team on the company/ agency side to polish or develop the ideas is asking for trouble.
I’m happy to give my time toward something that will benifit me and others, such as improving a program as widespread as MS word. Linux users are a real community that crowdsources just about everything because they end up getting even more out. What I mean is, I think it needs to be born from passion not potential pay off if it’s going to work out.
Mark me down as a fence-sitter on this. Edward’s point is pretty much how I feel. In theory, crowdsourcing is wonderful — it invites participation with the brand and it’s a brilliantly simple way to get phenomenal ideas from unexpected places. But the dark side? It’s a cheap way to get good stuff and not pay very much. Human nature being what it is, crowdsourcing will most likely land on the dark side. Yeah, I know, I’m a cynic. But I’m also a realist. The Bogusky’s of the world, brilliant as they are, are all about profit. Period.
Crowdsourcing, as part of a campaign to raise awareness and gain participation I think it’s great! And I agree with Valerie about it being a great source of creativity for non-profits and volunteer staff.
On the flip side, I feel that companies who use it for cheap labor are really cheapening their own brand. There are plenty of account executives, planners, creatives and others who work very hard to build brands and brand messages. Inherent in those messages is what said brand is about: brand values, lifestyle, essentially, what they, as a brand, stand for and why they matter in this marketplace or even in their industry. And the campaign that brings that message to the public may be in the form of print, interactive, viral, guerrilla, and yes, even crowdsourcing…
But to simply crowdsource a new logo, print ad or website, belittles the work that we, as an industry, work hard to achieve. Because if we’re going to be bombarded with advertising and marketing, I’d rather it be clever and beautiful than something that’s cheap and “good enough”.
Final note: For those who say crowdsourcing is great for brands who want consumers to take part in shaping a brand…you’re right, it is. But keep in mind that with that kind of crowdsourcing, you’re back at square one, where consumer involvement in the brand is a core brand value or belief. And the people most likely to participate like that, do so out of curiosity or love of the brand, not because it’s what they are normally paid to do.
I think crowdsourcing is a wonderful option when the intentions of the client are something other than “getting lots of work for pennies.”
When the crowdsourcing is sincerely offered as an opportunity for creative folks to promote a brand they like, support a cause they care about, promote themselves, and perhaps make a little cash I think great things will happen.
When it is offered as a crass dollars-to-donuts based decision, I think we’re seeing that few people with talent are participating, and the results ain’t grand. Of course lots of clients are really only interested in cheap, fast, and mediocre. I think they’ll love crowdsourcing once they try it (for the wrong reasons.)
As a creative, if I’m busy with good paying freelance, no I won’t participate.
If I’m not busy, I will.
As a brand, I would wonder why the people working on my project have the time. Is it reflective of their inability to find paying work?
But I would still use it strategically for PR value, to engage customers, and gain insight surrounding my service, potential product offerings, etc.
Also, I think companies are missing an opportunity to use the crowdsourcing model internally, to garner innovative business ideas from employees at every level.
My two cents.
I think crowdsourcing is fine in certain instances–with a small pool of creatives (like on PFTA), or when it’s a company wanting to get input from consumers on their brand/products. And possibly for pro-bono work as well.
But when it’s a matter of “do some stuff for me and if I like it, I’ll pay you,” that doesn’t fly. As Edward pointed out, that’s exploitation of unemployed creatives who need money or young creatives who are wanting to make their marks.
Ideally, I think companies that want to do crowdsourcing should have a pool of creatives they work with, and they offer assignments to 5 or 10 of them at a time. Give everyone a small fee for their time, with fair payment being given to the “winner” when an idea, design, whatever is selected.
That way no one works for free, and it’s more certain that the ideas will be professional and usable.
Continued from the live chat. I’m in favor of a blind auction system where a limited number of teams/individuals are submitting with second round of teams being chosen. The second round determines the team who is awarded the client, while the teams who are not chosen are compensated for their time. Maybe their is some sort of system that keeps teams anonymous to the client but shows a rating, determined by prior pitches won or level of seniority of team. I guess the criterion and minutiae would be worked out later. Just my two cents.
As a professional designer I would never participate in a crowdsource project. The rates for logos, print materials and websites are so laughably low that I’d be better off altogether abandoning design and taking a job washing dishes. Which is what this will ultimately lead to if crowdsourcing becomes a standard provider for marketing and communications services. Why would anyone go to school for 4 years to learn the craft of design when all they have to look forward to upon graduation is working on spec for the faint hope of a disgustingly low payout. All talented designers will eventually leave the profession and all we’ll be left with are “photoshop dynamos” who think the key to imaginative, effective design is applying gradients to system fonts. Welcome to hell.
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