Ultimately, No Spec explanation maybe misleading by people who are “ultra No spce supporters”!

I think NO Spec comes into play when a corporate needs a logo/below the line ad/campaign art which would take them weeks and maybe even months to sit with the artist and iron out the minute details, this REQUIRES money and time on the part of the artist and hence in these instances no designer in the right mind must do any Spec work for the client.

However, if its a small competition and me as a freelance artist has got some time, then I would love to do it and see where my imagination takes me without the client on my head.

Ultimately its your choice. And you will learn from it accordingly.

aj has also given good reasoning.

Most people think that spec work is bad for designers because they aren’t getting paid and good for the people hiring because they get it free but remember YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR.

Design work is a process aimed at developing a plan or a solution based on specific goals. During the initial phase of a design project the designer works with the client to learn about their needs and aims and goals and does research to learn as much as s/he can to reach the project goals. This means a lot of work to get the right design solution. To jump to a solution and provide spec work means you are skipping or rushing or guessing about that in between phase. So what’s the spec work then uninformed solutions or goals. It’s speculative solutions that are not the result of careful design work but guess work. Would you risk reling on guess work when hiring any other contractor or professional to provide you with services personally or professionally? Is it really worth the risk to your brand identity or your interior design [fill in type of design work] ?

Could you imagine going into a lawyer and telling them you won’t hire them until they provide you with a draft “concept” of a will or a business agreement specific to your project without fully understanding your needs? Would you run off an use this spec work to secure your future? Or how about a Dr. who would give out a trial free diagnosis before you decide to use them as your regular Dr. Would you actually trust a Dr. that would do that? I wouldn’t and I wouldn’t trust a designer who would try to design (i.e. plan) a project without fully understanding the project or doing the research and necessary steps to complete the process to reach a solution.

There are tons of analogies to other professions but the point is SPEC WORK is a disservice to the client and a waste of time for both parties.

I strongly agree with Nate. If you’re entering a contest, in the back of your head you must always have that idea that you probably won’t win.

Also, if you’re entering contests to pay for your bills you’ll be homeless in no time soon.

No right-minded professional will expect to live off spec work. On the other hand, freelancers will jump at the occasion of any free advertising. That’s of course if you’re in need of any exposure at all.

Matthew, I think you’re just trying to attack any of the above said. You don’t go off buying a computer software and office space just for a lousy contest. No. You go off buying that trying to make some real money from paid work.

If you’re interested in participating, you might use those in making and submitting your work. No one will ever make you buy that kind of stuff just to enter a contest.

I love Nate’s expression “don’t go around pissing in everyone elses cheerios”. If the contest is not interesting to you, you are not forced to participate but remember that “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure”.

You, Matthew, are probably trying to be over-protective with some newbies whom, you think, will be in loss after participating in such a contest. This discussion is a great way of showing off that and I thank you, seriously, for bringing it up. On the other hand, most freelancers get exposure out of these things too. This is up to each participant to decide if they will commit to such a task.

On a side note to the organizers of the contest here at Devlounge I’d have some issues to point out. It may be just my case but I think it was all planned in a haste.

Giving participants just around two weeks to submit their work, and this during the Easter holidays may haven’t been the smartest decision. Just speaking on my part, I had a thought of participating with something but I was in the middle of another, paid, project that required my attention. This, coupled with a few days of well-earned vacation, narrowed my spec-work time to a few busy days.

I’m not looking for compassion but I think that the low participation rate may have been influenced by the fact that the competition was on a tight schedule in a very chaotic time-frame with the holidays and such.

I was planning on submitting something, and I was confident it would be just for the exposure. I hadn’t dreams for the Zune but now seeing that this sparked such a feverish discussion I regret not taking the time to submit something. I could really have spoken from the other side, as opposed to Matthew’s opinion.

=D

Btw, 100% off topic, but nice site design. Could end up in this weeks Friday Focus

Life is speculation.

There are no guarantees. That client you’re pitching your designs to? (S)he could say no. Then you’d be out the time you prepared.

That job interview you spent 3 hours at? Guess what, you might not get the job.

That design contest you entered? Hey, guy, news flash! This isn’t your t-ball team where everyones a winner, and we all get a cupcake afterwards.
Someone will win, everyone else will lose.

There are plenty of industries where spec work is done, and in fact, for an entrepreneur, any industry they go into will be spec work.

The problem isn’t the morons posting ads on Craigs List offering potential riches if you help them set up their animatronic hentai porn site for free.
The problem is dopes who say yes.

And if they find a dope who is willing to do the site for free, whats the harm in that? The dope is either going to learn his lesson (as we all did), get stinking rich, OR never do design work again.

I’m fine with all three outcomes. Why? Because that dope is fully capable of making grown up choices.

So, my advice? If your design competitions are cutting into your billable hours, then use your grown up powers of time management, and don’t waste your time.

There was a great article on Sitepoint, I believe about this sort of thing.

The author said something about splitting his time 70% billable, 30% spec. Sounds about fair to me.

Or, if you really want to flex your economic muscles, do 100% billable, and 0% spec.

But don’t go around pissing in everyone elses cheerios because you can’t win a design competition, and therefore it must be an exploitative technique by the man to get all of your free design work.

Trust me, most of the crap entered in a design competition is throw away anyways.

There was a famous artist, his name escapes me, but he said that every artist has 100,000 bad drawings in him, and that once he’s gotten rid of all 100,000 he is now a master.

So think of design contests as a way for the collective mass to expunge their bad work, bringing the world closer to having more great artists.

You don’t need a computer, software, maybe office space (certainly office supplies)? Just because we don’t need to buy spark plugs doesn’t mean we can afford to work for free!