It's not all bad
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- gramme
Thought this was an interesting little article on how legit firms/agencies can benefit from the crowdsourcing movement without having to cash in their self respect. I'll be interested to hear a few good "specific tactics" in the next one.
- gramme0
One thing I don't see as a new thing is the notion of firms selling their thinking more than their doing. Since before the days of Rand and Loewy, good design has always been about paying close attention to a client's problem and then finding appropriate solutions, where the "doing" is merely the physical result of good thinking.
- lots of 'decent' firms still seem to be selling design items/commodities as apposed to solutions.baseline_shift
- but i agree about crowd sourcing as having the potential to 'weed out' bad/cheap clientsbaseline_shift
- bigtrick0
the problem i see is that the article categorizes between "good" and "bad" clients, whereas in reality some of the "bad" clients may just be uninformed. I could see someone knowing nothing about design choosing to crowdsource a logo or a concept, since from a neophyte's perspective, crowdsourcing is a lot cheaper and allows you to pull from ostensibly a wider pool of talent. problem is, it will take them a long time, if at all, to realize that what they bought is not that good - and even when they do realize their logo sucks or whatever, they may not make the link in their head between crowdsourcing = shallow design.
- version30
bad clients: i hear what you said, i just don't care, i'm paying you remember?
good clients: this is my budget, how can you help?
- ukit0
"Even if we end up disagreeing on that point, it really doesn’t matter. The change is already underway, and resisting it makes as much sense as promising to hold an inner tube under water forever. "
To which I say...why? Because a guy on a blog says so? Show me one, single successful, amazingly good project completed using "crowd sourcing"...there isn't one.If it hasn't been proven to produce good results for high end clients, why bother? Are we all slaves to whatever some idiot decides is the "next big thing" conceptually, whether or not it works?
- spendogg0
This Agency just opened in here in Boulder. Former CP+B peeps. It is all based on crowdsourcing. It is causing a bit of discussion around here. They crowdsourced their logo.
- ukit0
So let's say I want to develop a Flash microsite to promote my product with them. How would the process work?
- tell them your budget is 50 bucks.akrokdesign
- 40 for them, 10 for the winning design. lol.akrokdesign
- Right - but how do they even complete the job - all on Crowdspring?ukit
- bigtrick0
v&s seems interesting - for their crowdsourcing effors, they say "we also reward for participation." however, this does not seem to be true for their crowdsourced logo:
http://www.crowdspring.com/proje…
- ukit0
Why would I even go to an agency if I want to crowdsource? So they can bill me 100k to tell me which of the free submissions on Crowdspring to pick? LOL
- gramme0
I'm not sure he's saying we should give in to the pressure, ukit. I think he's just saying the crowdsourcing method is not going anywhere, and that designers should clearly position themselves as people who solve problems, rather than people who just crank out wallpaper a la crowdspring.
It's all kinda silly imo, because most good designers have been doing this for a long time. I do think it's good though to be forced into thinking about and then articulating what separates a crowdsource designer vs. a non-crowdsource designer. I don't see any signs that the vast majority of smart clients are buying the design as commodity approach.
- ukit0
Perhaps the key is to separate what it does do well - simple ideation/ brainstorming - from what it can't do - everything else.
In terms of building an entire agency around it, I think it's more of a gimmick than anything else. Once you get past the ideation stage, you'll still need a team of dedicated designers/devs/ etc to complete the project.
- gramme0
I agree ukit, but even in regard to brainstorming, more heads and hands doesn't = better. That's why I'm interested in seeing what specific ways this guy will suggest to use crowdsourcing while maintaining self respect (and financial solvency). Because I for one have no interest in doing all the thinking yet none of the crafting.
- ReCourses0
Interesting discussion, folks. If any of you would like to keep the discussion going, I'm glad to answer questions. I don't have all the answers--I'm just trying to think about the present as it applies to the future, like all of you.
- SoulFly0
I'm sorry I've been out of the loop... but know that I'm out of my cave - what is crowdsourcing?