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MiloNelakho
Aug '20
1

This was in response to a thread that may or may not be deleted. Either way, I think this is useful information for anyone contacted with a dodgy offer/commission, or an offer/commission in general if they've never received one before. Any professional artist with experience in this is free to add their points as well. The better informed we all are about art, money, and our rights, the safer the general community.

Cheers.

A lesson in exploitative commissions:

  1. These people operate under an ignorance policy. If they know that theirs is the only offer you may have ever received, they will offer you the lowest possible one because they believe you do not have the frame of reference to critique it. Which is why they frequent spaces that are not predominantly full-time, career labourers (i.e. creative writing forums that skew on the younger side, Upwork, free serialisation platforms etc)

  2. They only thrive where they believe you do not have access to industry resources or advice to educate yourself with.

  3. They aren't ignorant in their exploitation. If they want a proofreader, it is because they recognise proofreading as skilled labour that requires fair compensation. Problem is, as stated above, they do not want (and most often cannot) pay you fairly. As a result, they will look for this labour in places where they value it more than the person they are looking to exploit.

  4. They rarely hold up to professional scrutiny. So many of you have done such wonderful work in breaking down the inconsistencies, inaccuracies, illegalities (my god so much of this is just straight up illegal in most well-regulated spaces) and straight up lies. Thank you for that. I know I've learned a lot.

  5. Even when they are honest, they are lying. [Paid But Low] is meant to give the impression that they recognise this as exploited labour, but they acknowledge it to beat your own common sense to the punch. If they are clear about the deception, it's to remove your ability to work it out for yourself and set up that mental boundary.

Things to do when confronted with exploitative commissions/offers/contracts.

  1. Report them. You are under no obligation to engage with a person, site, or company that you feel is being predatory.

  2. Contact a profesisonal. Either to offer you advice on why the offer is bad or to help call out the offer in hopes of warning others. Contact them regardless, even if you think the offer is great. Always gain perspective before agreeing or signing anything.

  3. Educate yourself on the value of artistic labour. Even if your webcomic or novel is only a hobby, you should make sure you know enough about your skills to understand their value, not just in case someone tries to exploit you, but because it's also nice to know that your work can be properly valued if you ever decide to "go pro" with it.

  4. And I cannot stress this enough - warn somebody. Remember how these people thrive on no one knowing they're being exploited? Yeah, they can't do that in an environment where they are known entities.

  5. Your labour, your skills, and your intellectual property are yours first and foremost. Protect them first, even if you think you may miss out on an offer if you don't accept it quickly. These people thrive on making you feel like you have no option but them, and placing a time limit or any other kind of pressure on that is a known tactic for getting you to act without protecting yourself first.

  6. Never accept $1 for any sort of labour. PayPal is gonna take 0.80c anyway.

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pinned Aug 2, '20

AWFrasier
Aug '20

And for writers getting approached by what may seem like professionals:

Writers Beware is an archive of scammy editors, agents, publishers, contests, etc. Has a lot of great resources.

And as a general advice: If someone approaches you, google them. Chances are, someone out there has written about them if they're scammy (Something like Dreame/Ficfun for example are notorious for poaching unknowing authors and getting them stuck in rights-grabby contracts and there's been written extensively about them online)

There's usually also reviews of apps - so if you're approached by one, check out the reviews. The bad ones often have very bad reviews since it's all about capitalising on people who might not know better.

KRWright
Aug '20

Some here on contracts too:

Snickerdoodles
Aug '20

I'm presuming it's still okay to accept bids from the lowest bidders.

KRWright
Aug '20

People can still accept whatever they accept - so long as they're doing it knowingly. No one can stop someone from submitting to low price bids. But more people probably need to know what the standard is, so that those price bids aren't 0.0001 per word.

Snickerdoodles
Aug '20

We're not gonna ask anyone to work for less than their fair market value. But at the same time, we are aiming for the lower end of the market.

AWFrasier
Aug '20

@Sir_Snickerdoodles For lower pay, you'll also have to expect lower quality. Most professionals put in the time they're paid for, so if you're low-balling them, they most likely won't put in their best efforts or go above and beyond to satisfy you as a customer.

The good ol' "You get what you pay for" is very much a thing in the creative industry as well.

MiloNelakho
Aug '20
Snickerdoodles

Accept whatever you're comfortable with, just make an educated decision. I will say this, though, consistently accepting bids under industry standard normalises those bids. If 100 people in a field of 150 accept $20/hr, that's the standard. If the other 50 accept $10/hr, the standard drops to accomodate that data, assuming they're all of equal expertise. It's a self-regulated market/gig economy. This is why entry-level companies often march in lock-step around rates, so that they aren't pressuring each other to offer higher bids and screwing each others' business models (in ghostwriting mills, for example, this is generally between $0.7 - $1.10 per 1000 words).

Snickerdoodles
Aug '20
AWFrasier

That is completely fine. We're looking to get a product out quickly and consistently. Quality comes in third place, I'm afraid.

AWFrasier
Aug '20

Also consider rush-fees. A lot have those. So if you're hiring someone and expect the product to be finished within either a couple of weeks or even days, some put in extra fees as they'd have to push other obligations aside to work on your project.

MiloNelakho
Aug '20
AWFrasier

Yup! If a company/client wants to negotiate something outside of the agreed scope, you should renegotiate pay as well. The practice of sneaking in extra work under the guise of preferences/tweaks is called scope creeping, and is a predatory behaviour when someone is not fairly compensated for it, or when a client threatens to cancel a commission if the artist does not agree to additional terms.