Another Art “Contest” Scam

Yet another major company that should know better is conducting another of those online “art contests”, where they invite artists to create visual pieces of art for “a chance to win $$$” and of course to have your work recognized by “really important people”.

This time it’s Universal Pictures, and they want artists to create a new horror character to go along with their famous line-up of horror/monsters for a chance to win $10,000 and to have your work “recognized by a panel of visionary Hollywood filmmakers and creatives”.

And, of course, like all of these “contests” this is part of the rules:

BY SUBMITTING AN ARTWORK ENTRY, YOUR SUBMISSION IMMEDIATELY BECOMES THE SOLE PROPERTY OF TONGAL OR ITS ASSIGNEES – SEE OFFICIAL RULES FOR MORE DETAILS ABOUT OWNERSHIP OF ENTRIES. YOU MAY NOT PUBLICLY SHARE OR PUBLISH YOUR SUBMISSION IN ANY MANNER AND YOU MAY NOT POST OR UPLOAD YOUR SUBMISSION TO ANY WEBSITE OR VIDEO HOSTING SITE (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, FACEBOOK, TWITTER, YOUTUBE OR VIMEO), WITHOUT THE PRIOR EXPRESS WRITTEN CONSENT OF TONGAL. FAILURE TO COMPLY WITH THIS REQUIREMENT MAY RESULT IN DISQUALIFICATION OF YOUR ENTRY IN THE PROJECT.

Yet more evidence the work of creators like writers, artists, designers, animators, etc is valued poorly. Rather than hire professionals to create a new character, Universal conducts a stunt like this, offering a pittance in payment for the copyrights to the “winner” and also getting FREE copyright/ownership to everything else submitted. These contests are inevitably followed by an outcry by creative people trying to make a living in their field who are, rightfully, insulted by something like this. And inevitably it makes no difference. The art contests keep on coming, even from companies with deep pockets and some (like Universal) who have those deep pockets largely because of the intellectual properties they own and protect fiercely.

So why do these types of contests keep happening? I think for two reasons:

1. Creatives keep participating in them
2. The social media attention these contests generate

I long ago gave up hoping the first one listed above would stop happening. There will always be young and hungry artists, writers, designers, etc who are willing to do work for free to “get their name out there”. We were ALL one of those once. Universal will get a lot of really bad, amatuer concepts, a bunch of pretty good ones, and probably a handful of exceptional designs, and will pay peanuts for it all. I hope whoever ends up winning this contest gets a career going thanks to winning. I also hope that 15 years from now when they are facing a marketplace that undervalues what they do and are constantly being approached by “clients” who want to use their work for free or next to nothing, they remember participating in this contest and how much Universal Studios valued everyone’s art at the time.

What really bothers me about this kind of thing is not that it’s happening, or that artists participate in it. There have ALWAYS been people and companies out there angling to try and get whatever they can for as little as possible. It’s the fact that BIG TIME companies keep doing it. You’d expect something like this from some small production company doing B-lister films on a shoestring budget. This is Universal Studios. Then again big companies wanting work for free is also nothing new. Just watch this brief clip of the late Harlan Ellison telling the story of another big company trying to get free work:

The social media aspect of this is what I think really drives these things. Companies like Universal can easily afford to pay professional rates to a whole team of creatives to brainstorm and come up with a visual campaign for their properties. But all they get from that is to drop the new properties to their usual audience. With one of these “contests”, they generate interest and social media buzz, get their properties being talked about, and build some anticipation of the “big reveal”. I am not sure how much actual benefit that really garners them, but there’s little doubt it gets people talking about it. I’m doing that now, in fact. Negatively, sure… but maybe a few people who didn’t know about this now do, and “Universal Monsters” are on their minds for a time.

Mission accomplished, I guess.

I am not going to sit here and scold anyone who wants to participate in this. Just do it with your eyes open, understanding you are giving your time and talents away for nothing to a company that could afford to pay you enough to buy yourself a nice house out of their petty cash fund.