Two Brain Cells

Pixish is a new site which claims to use crowdsourcing and peer review to help businesses source custom photography and illustration.

From the site, here’s ‘how it works’:

1. Create an Assignment. Ask for what you want.
2. Get Submissions. People create and submit their work.
3. Peer Review. Community voting helps find the best.
4. Pick Winners. Select your favorites and download.
5. Rewards! Winners get prizes and rewards.

Now, maybe I’m just being cynical, but isn’t this just a way for businesses to get a load of free design on spec, something which is a big, big no-no for the creative industry?

In other words, artists spend their time creating something purpose-made for a business’s specification, and then, except for the ‘winner’, receive no compensation for the time involved.

I know there are lots of community art sites and artists out there who happily create stuff for free for the simple of joy of creating stuff. That’s great, and clearly what this site is based on. But tying it in so closely to ‘businesses paying for your work’ just feels incredibly skeevy to me, and bordering on exploitation of talented amateurs.

Still, it’s a free market, I guess, and nobody’s forcing these artists to get involved. But the mere existence of things like this strengthens a increasingly popular mindset that says that creativity comes cheaply, and that the creators should take the financial and time risk of producing something that may not be what is wanted, rather than the purchaser taking that risk.

As AIGA (the professional association for design) says:

Organizations sometimes initiate contests as a way of developing logos or other identity work. Unlike disciplines in which the designer can bill for implementation of the proposed design (e.g., architecture), in communication design, the submitted solution already represents the bulk of the intellectual work…

AIGA believes that doing speculative work seriously compromises the quality of work that clients are entitled to and also violates a tacit, long-standing ethical standard in the communication design profession worldwide. AIGA strongly discourages the practice of requesting that design work be produced and submitted on a speculative basis in order to be considered for acceptance on a project.

Update: Pixish do mention these concerns on their About page:

But isn’t this spec work? We acknowledge that some artists are against working before there’s a contract in place, so they may not want to participate here. And that’s fine - Pixish isn’t for everyone. If you’re already making a living as a pro, hooray! We’re thrilled for you. But you’re lucky. There are a lot of really talented folks who aren’t. We want to give them a chance to get out there, get seen, and get paid.

Which is true, but doesn’t really address my problem with the culture and expectations that this sort of site perpetuates.