MRM Worldwide and Aniboom, a virtual animation company, have entered a “strategic alliance” that will give the agency access to 8,000 animators in 70 countries. Included in the partnership are plans to crowdsource creative concepts, a practice that got Crispin Porter + Bogusky some bad press from designers who see it as a diluting agent for their trade.
Aniboom explains their business:
“Aniboom cultivates animated content by leveraging the web, providing online animation opportunities such as animated competitions and free online animation software.”
MRM explains their crowdsourceing plans:
“Aniboom can execute advertisers’ concepts and creative ideas using a proprietary technology that organizes their animators into production teams. This process makes animation faster, cheaper and of comparable quality to traditional studios.”
And their plans to have animators compete for work: “MRM’s clients can launch a content creation competition in the Aniboom community for advertising solutions and have the community at large or a panel of judges select the top finalists and ultimate winner of the assignment. Or the competition could be private, with only the final results exhibited to the public.”
Crowdsourcing/competitive RFPs are part of a group of highly-volatile trends that have become increasingly popular. While crowd sourcing has been most detrimental to designers of late, cloud computing and free-content publishing have hurt (and helped) the IT development and journalism businesses, much as designers feel crowdsourcing has affected their industry.
These trends breed competition and bolster the idea that capitalism weeds out weak links. They also make it hard/unappealing for established industries to bid on business that’s sought through these methods, as cost can outweigh profit. But if there’s one thing free-trending has done, it has leveled the playing field somewhat for new players. May the best _____ win.
This happened awhile back for journalists, who used to expect anywhere from 40-50 cents per word for a freelance story. When your average piece is 1,500 words that’s not a bad take. Today a writer is lucky to get $10 per post, a change that was ushered in by blogging.
Oren Frank, Global Chief Creative Officer of MRM:
“At MRM Worldwide, we build Customer Utility which is a means to make the brand message itself useful to the customer. In marketing, useful is the new clever, and Aniboom is certainly useful and certainly clever.”
And now other industries are feeling the same storm brewing. By partnering with Aniboom, MRM unwittingly aids in devaluing design/animation creators. But they also save money. More on Aniboom, here.
More: “CP+B’s Gets Grief for Crowdsourcing Logo, Own Site Used Against Them”