Full price vs Free

I have two price categories for my design work: full price or free.

Both prices get top quality work, I always do my personal best for my clients. Yet how the work gets done is quite different.

Full price work is always done on contract through my LLC.  That contract that entitles you to all sorts of things we agree upon in advance: working deadlines, fast communication, influence over the work, a method to adjust the plan as the work evolves, and what IP you get to keep.  As long as you pay your bills on time we keep happily working together as defined in the contract. You pay with money, you make the decisions.

Free work generally has no contract and is thus on my terms.  I work at my pace, in my style, at my scope, and at my discretion.  I retain copyrights and moral rights to assign as I see fit.  I reserve the right to limit the scope of free work at my continuous discretion, as free has a natural tendency to drift towards unlimited and undervalued. I pay with time, I make the decisions.

In both cases I only accept work that I can honor with commitment and intention: if I have offered to do the work I will do it.  But the method of execution between full price or free is wildly different and it's important for my clients and I to set expectations accordingly. Shared understanding facilitates mutual satisfaction. Let’s do good and be well.

Human : Machine I/O

I design physical products with digital capabilities. Accordingly I am constantly navigating the boundaries of perception for both human & machine. We build in our own image, and so we should understand the parallels between how people and devices operate in the classical robots paradigm of Sense / Plan / Act.

I am an engineer by formal training and a designer by experience and disposition. So I tend to start analytical and then move into the intuitive. Accordingly I set out to understand the robotic mantra of Sense Plan Act with by exhaustively exploring what that means for both our biological structures and engineered devices.

To wit, I started compiling a spreadsheet that covers every human and machine I/O that I could conceivably utilize in designing products and experiences. Every human sensor in the nervous system. Every category of miniaturizable digital sensor. Every means for a electronic or electromechanical device to do something perceptible.

Clearly this requires painting with broad strokes, but I strive for clarity and specificity where possible.

The work-in-progress list can be found in this Google Doc spreadsheet. Comments and suggestions for additions are welcome.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1oBe27BKbpvts7UNANxv9ZgIUA5QyFdx9Bppj7GQuYaw/

We have great responsibilities as shapers of usable technology, let us use these powers for good. Build well and be well.