Mrs. Mecomber's Scrapbook

Well, this is a very interesting concept: crowdsourcing. I’ve been seeing it done by news outlets, but this is the first I’ve seen for a design need.

Crowdsourcing is outsourcing a task to a “crowd” of people, kind of like an open call for something like employment, or services needed. My local news organization has been doing this for a long time, regarding their annual calendar fund drive– they ask the public to submit photos for the weather calendar. A certain group of people vote on the selections, and the winners get their photos published in the calendar with attribution. The news company makes out well– they sell the calendars for $20 a piece. Nice.

Anyway, crowdsourcing is a new way to get out your need to a large group of people; but that’s the thing- how do you go about this? There’s a website called Prova.fm and they are making known their ability to help small businesses (and of course, large businesses) and individuals with their graphic needs. For example, let’s say your new business needs a logo and a website. Through Prova.fm, you can have advertisement design contests– inform them of your needs and how much you want to pay, and Prova.fm can connect with experienced designers from all over the world to submit their designs and ideas.

Prova.fm is having a promotional event: they’re offering 1,000 free printed postcards and business cards for your business for signing up with them; see their site for details. Crowdsourcing is knd of cool!