Will work for... FREE?

[mTk]

All this whining seems somewhat amusing to me.
First of all, if you're actually competing (I don't mean living in the same town, but actually fighting over the same jobs) with "freebie kids", then I'm getting really suspicious about your skills chaps... no offence, anyone.

For second, think about this from the view of a 15 year old newbie kid - If you don't have a portfolio, you won't get a job of any kind. The only option is to make a half-free (or yes, even free, if you're desperous) site.
When the second option is to never get a job, newbies are somewhat forced to keep their prices really low.

We are were newbies once, and I bet none of us got a 200EUR/hour (God I love the Euro... now I don't have to speak of dollars any longer ) job right after they graduated from high school.
The difference beetween 'want everything free' and 'Real' companies is large... in case you're competing with free-work 14 year kiddies, you're probably not working with the right kind of companies.

[ViperGeckoFreak]

Originally posted by pheck

Originally posted by erova
aren't you from minnesota or something--make a web petition to get the twins to stay? (obviously i'm reaching here)

ha ha ha. we're getting a new stadium i heard, eh hells and vgf? i rely on you fellas to keep me updated on MN until i get back.

yeah and we gotta pay for it with our freakin taxes >

</off subject>

[mmreed]

Yep... nothing beats doing a concept, pitching the client... calling back and having them say:

"Sorry... but my accountant's son bought Frontpage and said he'd do it for nothing"

[TheOriginalFlashDavo]

Originally posted by mTk
All this whining seems somewhat amusing to me.
First of all, if you're actually competing (I don't mean living in the same town, but actually fighting over the same jobs) with "freebie kids", then I'm getting really suspicious about your skills chaps... no offence, anyone.

Most national graphic design associations are against any - yes, any - work for free. That is there ethical viewpoint. Are you saying they're whiners?
(in fact check in the States, I think it may actually be illegal)

Whatever level you want to look at it - large effect or small effect - any free work does hurt this industry in some way:

- the more really bad Flash sites out there the worse reputation Flash as a tool gets. The same goes for badly desined HTML sites.

- a business who wants a "freebie" is usually also a business that can be sold the right site developed in the right way with a proper business model for at least a few hundred dollars - maybe as part of an overall marketing campaign involving print ads and posters. However if some kid has done a freebie for them which has given them no return then their perception of the web's value goes down. That's obvious.

- ANY free work of ANY kind always devalues the associated profession. Think about it: if (maybe "when" with all the new digital equipment) kids start producing their own "free" 30 second advertisements does that mean TV production houses have to start competing for the small business market? There's enough bad TV ads out there already - you want to have more ba dones, and really devalue TV advertising? That's what would happen.

And while these small businesses are seeking or being offered free work you have countless charity groups that are dying for someone to do some free work for them - how about limiting freebies/pro bonos to them?

Look at the bigger picture mate. It's not whining to be concerned about this, there's a legitimate small business market being taken away by the proliferation of free work. No, that's not the market I'm targeting myself, but it may well be the target market for a professional colleague of mine, so as an ethical member of this industry I am concerned.

You should be as well.

Cheers
Dave

[Hellsbellboy]

Some of you sound like you just want to protect what you think is yours. Just cause you happened to get there first. It's a competitive market. Their is no Web Design union that everyone has to become a member of. It's NOT illegal to design a site for free. You want job security, your going to have to adapt to the new environment. As far as being unethical, says who? People willing to do free work to try to get into webdesign they don't owe you anything. That's what competition is all about, cause they can do a site for free and you can't that's your problem. You're going to have to come up with a new stratigy to overcome this. Whether it is becoming a better salesmen or learning more and new skills. It's a free market workplace, not a charity. Oh so and so has a family to feed so I better not go into webdesign. If your that worried maybe you need to find a new career. As long as there is money to be made, more and more people will try and get into freelancing webdesign. Whether they be 14 or 44 years old. And sooner or later those that can adapt will be here and those that can't will be gone.

[johnie]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by TheOriginalFlashDavo

you have countless charity groups that are dying for someone to do some free work for them - how about limiting freebies/pro bonos to them?

This is basically my philiosophy. I limit my free work to charities, non-profit orgs, family, Open Source projects, Community projects, and helping people on boards as long as it is helping instead of doing the whole project.

If you have an low budjet art film I will help without asking for money but I don't consider web exposure compensation... other forms of compensation such as viewing/copy of the Film, perhaps a film prop, or other compensations are aceptable to me.

- this is just me though.

I don't share the notion that it is unethical/illegal todo some work for free although I do feel it is silly for both the service provider and consumer.

[TheOriginalFlashDavo]

Originally posted by Hellsbellboy
Some of you sound like you just want to protect what you think is yours. Just cause you happened to get there first. It's a competitive market. Their is no Web Design union that everyone has to become a member of. It's NOT illegal to design a site for free. You want job security, your going to have to adapt to the new environment. As far as being unethical, says who? People willing to do free work to try to get into webdesign they don't owe you anything. That's what competition is all about, cause they can do a site for free and you can't that's your problem. You're going to have to come up with a new stratigy to overcome this. Whether it is becoming a better salesmen or learning more and new skills. It's a free market workplace, not a charity. Oh so and so has a family to feed so I better not go into webdesign. If your that worried maybe you need to find a new career. As long as there is money to be made, more and more people will try and get into freelancing webdesign. Whether they be 14 or 44 years old. And sooner or later those that can adapt will be here and those that can't will be gone.

And unfortunately the attitude that is harming our industry.

Depends on what you're after doesn't it? A quick buck or an industry with a viable future?

Check these for those that give a damn:

http://www.agda.com.au/dm/Free_Pitching.pdf (free pitching, free sites - same issue of devaluing design)
http://www.agda.asn.au/aboutagda/more/codeofethics.html
http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm?ContentID=141

And an article here - http://www.hive.com/pages/onfreepitching.html - from a company who's put it into words very succinctly.

Any industry should work together to ensure a successful and viable future - not against one another.

And before anyone counters with te obvious, free work and free pitching are one and the same - any work of value done for nothing. If you read I think it's the second link above it taks about putting a value on everything you do, and that's how it should be.

Cheers
Dave

[Hellsbellboy]

see the problem is u see it as doing working for nothing.. and I see it as doing work for the future. Not everyone started when companies were willing to pay a kid $1000 bucks to make a crappy html site. Now a days without a resume, or portfolio or some connection you won't make it. So some people have to do a free site or 2 or 3. I'm sure at the end of the day they don't like doing so, but that's the price they feel they must pay to get into the business. Are they out for a quick buck? sure some are.. but I think those will be the first to pack it up.

[TheOriginalFlashDavo]

There are dozens and dozens of charity sites and sites for causes you could be doing for free to build your portfolio up. Not only does it increase the work you have to show, but it also impresses potential employers and clients.

This is the way to get "free" work without harming the industry you're trying to get into.

Think about it - this "start" you're trying to get is resulting in there being less paying jobs out there to offer newbies.

There is a reason why every national or regional graphic design association I know of is against free work and free pitching. Think about it folks....

[serpent star]

"Any work that must be done for non-profit reasons such as portfolios,
should not consist of identities that may be a profit to another designer/developer.
If you are currently stressing over your portfolio, what does it take to make a fake company up
with products A, B, C -> nothing; show your talents via dummie sites. We are in the creative field right ?

If you got talent and good sales technic, not having real sites as your portfolio will not hamper
your attempts to get contracts. If you are inexperienced, give a good price but not free.
Giving our services away for free will hurt our industry and affect the upcoming developers,
even the ones that think they are actually benefiting from giving there services away." said a person on another board.


This guy is right on. Build mockups. Heck start a business. Purchase a domain to go along with your mock up company. make an investment in your future. Free work hurts in the long run. Every client that recieves free work is another client you will not be able to build a professional relationship with.

I just contacted a potential client today. This small restaurant owner had an employee's husband offer freework and followed thru with some not so flattering frontpage work. http://www.web58.com/Tabberts.htm The site did nothing for the restaurants business. In fact it probably took away from it. Well long story short, now that she has a site and found no ROI from the site, she is not willing to pay for a site to be reconstucted and optimized. This poor experience translated in her mind to the web, not being an important medium. I think if this first experience was avoided she may have been a client for a good design firm for years to come. I hope you see my point as to why I think this is damaging.




[Edited by serpent star on 06-14-2002 at 03:11 AM]

[enemem]

ok - this is turning into a very interesting discussion and I'm slowly changing my views on the subject (an internet first, surely )

I still think that a distinction needs to be made.

On the one hand there is a large group of potential clients with little knowledge on what the internet is and how it can function for their business. If designers specifically target that market and sell a low-quality product to it, then that is damaging behaviour (and would be covered by FlashDavo's code of ethics for example).

On the other hand, you have 'budding' designers who offer low-quality work. They know they can't compete but feel they need the experience, so they offer their work for free. The client laps it up, the result is disappointing. The problem wasn't the free service, the problem is the lack of business sense and foresight on the client's side.

That can't be solved using codes of ethics or complaining about the offers of free service. It is damaging to the design community but on a different level than was portraied here - and again, the problem is the client, not the supplier. This is perfectly demonstrated by the examples of 'sorry, xyz will do it for free with Frontpage' - even after they have heard your pitch, they still went with the free service.

- n.

[Gloomycus]

People are here who go looking for people who work for free and going to get a bull**** site which won't help them at all. I know that if I see someone looking for someone to design something for free, I just ignore it. Its not going to help me in the long run, and money is extremely important. If a potential client isn't willing to fork out any money or something else (ie. the furniture Fuzi gave us), then its not worth doing.

[[-S|NiStEr_MiNd-]]

Originally posted by Gloomycus
People are here who go looking for people who work for free and going to get a bull**** site which won't help them at all. I know that if I see someone looking for someone to design something for free, I just ignore it. Its not going to help me in the long run, and money is extremely important. If a potential client isn't willing to fork out any money or something else (ie. the furniture Fuzi gave us), then its not worth doing.

Exactly. The cold hard fact is that money makes this world function. Any business that tries to convince someone to do work for free is NOT the kind of business you want to deal with. Professional business people realize that any marketing project involves money. As people have stated before, doing the work for free is just contributing to universally devalue our profession. And I don't like hearing the excuse that doing web design for free if you're just starting out is ok. You don't see your local clothing store that just opened up giving away free clothes to everyone that asks because they just opened up and aren't established yet. No, because work goes into the making of that product, and that work has value.

I know it won't stop people from doing free work, so I guess that's all I have to say about that. Anyone that lives in the REAL world can't do work for free or they wouldn't survive. I have bills out my ears and a child so I know the value of my work. Because without that value I wouldn't be able to survive. And I'm not complaining about it. I love my job and i'd never go to a new profession. I do it for the enjoyment, but in the same respect I have to be real and do it for the money as well. It's still just a job.

[XDCG]

Sometimes its just good business. Think of it as a way to get clients in faster. Time is very valuable and the faster you get those clients in, the faster you can build your client base and have a foundation to stand on when you approach investors for funding. Take me for example. Im running a special right now where my clients can get a PERSONAL web page for free. I dont think i'd ever do an e-commerce site free of charge nor would I do an advertisement free of charge. Because when you think about it, if this business is going to run an ad, they already know advertising cost money. Same holds true when opening a store online. You cant open a store for free so why should we do e-commerce sites free? So my point is that its ok to offer free things to an extent. Look at all the big companies (AOL, Earthlink, AT&T, etc.) their main focus is the word FREE because they know people will sign a 2 year contract if they can get in free. At the same time, these companies can still go to the bank and get a loan off of that customer because they have them locked in for 2 years and can predict (once the customer starts paying of course) how much they will make off of them. So free is actually good business.

[Anna Banana]

So now that we know these things (free site, bad!)...how do we educate the general public/potential clients? I don't think the freebies will stop on account of the people offering them, a few might change their minds after reading the thread, but I don't think the majority of them really care what they're doing for the business. Chances are, they're still young enough to find another career if this one doesn't work out, or the industry is screwed by the time they get out of High School.

SO, I guess what Im saying is that I think the key is in getting the clients to understand that you pay designers for a reason. It has to be taken outside of Flashkit, and designer/dev groups, and into "the real world". And, I guess what I'm asking is, how do we do it?



-------------------
Fightin the Cause! Hehehe

[XDCG]

But heres the deal. Successful people are the ones who dont take short cuts. They know if they need a website, that its not going to be free. We as webmasters should only concern ourselves with those clients who have set aside a standard budget for their web design needs. I personally dont like to deal with ones who want SOMETHING for NOTHING. In my experience i've found that those types of people are not too successful in life in general. You have to give to get and the successful public knows this. We are ALWAYS gonna have those who want something for nothing. So my advice is be strong and endure and stick to your guns until the client that REALLY wants to do business comes along. Simple sales practice. ANd like I said earlier, Free is not a bad word IF you associate it with the right product.

[jgo]

first of all, well said XDCG

i agree that to build up your portfolio, it is much easier to use dummy companies (what i'm doing over summer) although - i have done one free piece of work, for my rugby club

originally posted by serpent star

We can talk about the trades if you would like... first of all, I have never heard of a construction company building a brick and mortar business for free just for the benefit of strengthening their resume.

i'll continue this theme, someone looking to build a shopping mall or a stadium won't go to the local brickie, they'll go to a major construction firm. the local brickie sticks to building walls and whatever until he strengthens his experience. if he sticks at it, maybe one day his company will grow to build stadiums or whatever.

the local guy won't build things for free because he still has to buy the bricks and so on. we have already paid for flash and all other expenses covered by our parents, so we are able to give away our spare time for free.

i never oversell my self. i was once asked to create a website for a company, but refused since i knew i was not able to make what they wanted at that time. i told them they would have to pay for it (it was an e-commerce site).

it is too easy for twelve year-olds who started with flash yesterday to claim that they have been working with it for years but their portfolio is being 'revamped'. this, i am definately against.

anyone that looks for free services should expect poor quality, lets face it - who has ever used free hosting? do you always expect wonderful service from that?

people who are charging for their services should be able to prove that they can offer a better quality product.

i actually agree with most of what has been said but that's my two cents (as they say).

[tonytryout]

Interesting discussion. When I was at university, I designed a website for university's football club (free of course).
This is "ok" because fair enough it is not really a company.

Unfortunately, I came out of university at the "wrong" time (2001 being a bad year for IT generally) and was not able to secure a job (I admit I did not look into web design/development initially). What could I do? I started looking for jobs in many sectors with no success. Learning new skills did not exactly managed to bring in job offers. Several members both already in several industries and in companies said that work experience and a "taste" of being in a business world would go a long way in securing a job.

So....I undertook a work placement for a company, my main role was to provide back-end product (e.g. database etc.) as well as a few Flash work. All this for free obviously in return of an excellent reference and work experience.

Should I be flamed for what I did?

The main problem I think is that there is a very fine line between "Hello company A, would you like a website? Unlike others, I can do it for free for the same quality of work" and "Hello Company A, I am looking to make a mark in the x industry and am wondering if you would consider in taking me on for y-week work placement".

</rant>

[serpent star]

Originally posted by tonytryout
Should I be flamed for what I did?

No flames, just good discussion.

I don't know what to say...

I don't want to stop anyone from being able to make a living.

Would building a good portfolio with mock up and charity sites provide the same benefits as your path?

I don't know.

[johnie]

Originally posted by tonytryout


So....I undertook a work placement for a company, my main role was to provide back-end product (e.g. database etc.) as well as a few Flash work. All this for free obviously in return of an excellent reference and work experience.

Should I be flamed for what I did?

The main problem I think is that there is a very fine line between "Hello company A, would you like a website? Unlike others, I can do it for free for the same quality of work" and "Hello Company A, I am looking to make a mark in the x industry and am wondering if you would consider in taking me on for y-week work placement".

</rant>

Absoultly not. the Intern/Aprentience program has been with us since the middle ages. It exists today and has existed for so long becuase it has merit. Also consider that doing "Free" work on a loss leader systerm is a valid bussiness practice employed by free web hosts and the such. They reel you in with a freebie that doesn't cost that much then make money on value added services or flat out other services (602 Office works this way as does AOL's free internet giveaway also note the Internet porn industry works on this manner- let them on the front porch/pallor for free but if they want more charge them). What doesn't seem to work is trading free for advertisement.

I think what these guys, at least some of them, are upset about is people doing "Free" work that normally would go to a freelancer.

In this scenerio the client asks for the services for free on a contractual level and the client may or may not get a usable site and the designer doesn't get the experience of working within an orginization nor the ability to list the company as a reference. If the client gets a bad site they then trash the medium if they get a good site they typically will brag about the price thus making thier associates expect the same for the same price or for a much reduced price.