“Hey, we need a designer, want to collaborate?”

“Hell yeah!” you respond, excited about making a little extra dolla for that sweet sweet electricity bill.

“There’s no payment, obviously, but it will be great exposure — we’ve got 100,000 followers who will see your work!”

…If you’ve had enough of the new wave of freebie culture and your hard work going underappreciated, read on, dear reader.

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Not Hot off the Press

• Exposure Doesn’t Pay the Bills: As Kerrie Hughes wrote in an article about designers’ fury over an unpaid graphic design role back in 2017: **“Working for free or for ‘exposure’ is a sore subject in the design community, but, sadly, one that crops way too often.” **The advert rather boldly (and naively) read: “The Volunteer Graphic Designer at SAHMRI is a volunteer position. This means that you perform all duties on a voluntary basis, of your own free will, and you will not receive payment for your work. You are not an employee of SAHMRI and you are not entitled to a salary or any other entitlements associated with employment.” Okay then. Unsurprisingly, this was met with a lot of backlash, with Nic Elridge (CEO of AGDA) taking to Twitter to vocalise his stance: “…our main effort today is to alert young designers to the fact that this is not ok.”
• “It’s Not a Real Job”Until Aldi starts accepting ‘exposure’ in exchange for my weekly groceries, I’m no longer accepting this as a legitimate form of payment — and nor should you. But in case you need further convincing, Digital Synopsis compiled a list of the best (or worst) exchanges between artists and nightmare clients from Twitter account For Exposure.

• What’s Your Worth?Inside Design (by InVision) hosted a really informative DesignTalk with Ran Segall on how to strategically price your design work. In his talk, Ran recounts how money wasn’t the initial draw for him, and as a result, has found it difficult to know what or when to charge: **_“I got in as a hobby. And starting out doing something that you love, you actually in a way feel bad charging a lot of money for something that you enjoy doing.” _**When pricing yourself, it’s a balancing act between hard graft and quality of life. More clients doesn’t always equal more money — use your pricing to increase your income and decrease the amount you work, as Jake Jorgovan states.
• Completely Free? No Thanks! In a strange instance of role reversal, we have a creator willingly offering a product for free, and the corporation refusing it. WordPress founding developer, Matt Mullenweg, recently became embroiled in a battle with Apple for cutting off updates to his app unless he agrees to adding in-app purchases to afford the most valuable company in the world 30%.

#freelancing #ux-design #ux #career-advice #design