Thoughts on Engineering, Photography, and Design.

Amy Hoy and Thomas Fuchs just may be the most impressive design & development duo on the internet. Amy’s designs are often so friendly you can’t help but smile and sign up, and Thomas, being the JavaScript mastermind that he is, adds some incredible UI touch.

To give something back, they’ve put up what they call Freelancember, which more-or-less gives advice to freelancers. And the design is the typical excellence we’ve come to expect from them. You should take a look.

With that said, this one kind of surprised me: Top 10 Things You’re Forgetting to Bill For. I just read it, so it’s still sinking in, but it did spawn the urge to write down a few thoughts regarding the topic.

Petty charges feel impersonal. I like to work on cool projects, but first and foremost, I like to work with cool people. People I’d like to be friends with. Putting something like “Copies & Faxes” on an invoice, to me, sends the message: we can never be friends, this is strictly a business relationship and you have to think twice before you give me a call (or send an email)–I’ll bill you for it!

Petty charges are a nightmare to keep track of. It’s hard enough trying to keep track of the time you’re actually working, it’s difficult to fathom recording every moment I think about a project, write an email, talk on the phone, make a copy, etc. Sure, I might be losing out on more income, but I’m not out to squeeze a client for every cent–I’m out to make a respectable living doing great work. That’s what makes me happy.

Petty charges cost more than they’re worth. In general, I think these petty charges cost far more than they’re worth, and not just monetarily speaking. Future work, recommendations, rewarding relationships, and so on are also at stake. People look out for friends, and it’s hard to imagine charging a friend for the gas you used driving to a meeting, isn’t it? Well, that goes both ways.

People like simple. A client would much rather get an invoice simplified down to expected services at a known cost. Mixing in erroneous expenses will add unnecessary complexity. Complexity leads to confusion, confusion leads to asking questions, and asking questions leads to distrust. Sure, you could add a few minutes to your other items, but that feels just as sleazy.

Now, I do understand the point they’re trying to make. If you sit down at your desk from 6pm to 11pm but only seem to accomplish a few simple tasks, it’s hard to eat 4 hours of personal time. There will undoubtedly be discussion, sketching, trial-and-error, etc. and it’s up to you to evaluate the situation. Sketching and productive design work? Sure. Writing up a contract and emailing it to a potential client? Absolutely not. That’s all I’m saying.

Just like I try to treat every project as if it were my own, I strive to treat every client the same way I would like to be treated. I’ve met some incredible people along the way, and have sustained solid relationships with great results. I personally don’t believe I would have gotten here if I billed my clients like a lawyer. Money isn’t the only way to be rewarded, remember that.

So, fellow freelancers: Lawyers can get away with billing that way because society has allowed them to set the expectation, but only another lawyer would think it’s not dirty to charge 4 minutes for an email reply. We’re not lawyers, so we shouldn’t bill as if we were.

While NOT charging for petty things may go unnoticed, I can assure you charging for them won’t. Think about the message you’re sending and ask yourself if it’s worth it.

With all of this talk of delicious going away, I too exported my bookmarks and decided to try out Pinboard. Before signing up I noticed there was a price, which I was not expecting. It was only a small one-time fee, worth the money alone just for safe-keeping of my years worth of bookmarks.

But what struck me the most was the fee itself: $6.47. It was kind of an odd number. After looking into it, I realized it’s actually quite smart.

Pinboard charges $0.001 times the number of customers it has, for each new user. And when you think about it, this works on a lot of different levels.

Spam protection. Immediate spam protection because spammers don’t pay. This keeps the system itself clean of spam-checking code, too. And not to mention serious users only. A win right off the bat.

Marketing. The longer you wait to sign up, the more it’s going to cost you. It gives you the “OMG I need to hurry” urge that brings out the impulsiveness in all of us.

Scaling. The more users they have, the more it costs to sign up per-user, hence, the more money they make to keep the service running.

One-time fee. I think most people would be more inclined to pay a larger one-time fee than a smaller recurring charge. It’s closure for customers and simplicity for Pinboard. Plus, even though it’s a one-time fee, the fee keeps going up, so in a way they’re still making money off of their other customers, but without charging them.

And I’m probably overlooking a few other things, but in general, I think that’s a pretty clever way to charge your users.

It’s mind-boggling how many times I’ve heard designers say something like “I can’t wait until CSS3 is supported across all browsers so I can start using it!” If that sounds like a reasonable claim to you, don’t worry, you’re not alone–even I used to think that way. But that perspective is a real problem.

If/When CSS3 is finally supported across all browsers, there will be browsers with CSS4 support. It’s a never-ending cycle. Some browsers will live on the bleeding edge of technology, and some will take years to catch up. That’s the way it will always be, so it doesn’t make sense to design by the least common denominator, hanging on to false hope, dreaming of the day when you’ll implement a design once. Your life as a designer is too short for that! You should be using the cool stuff as fast as it comes out (where applicable, of course).

Cross-browser support for CSS3 and similar technologies is often said to be the greatest day in a designer’s life. “Can you imagine the day when all browsers are the same?” Back to reality. I say the greatest day in a designers life is when clients begin to realize and understand that their design simply cannot look the same in every browser. That’s the breakthrough I’m waiting for, and that’s what will give designers more freedom to truly be creative.

Browses are different, we (designers and clients alike) need to accept that so we can move on and create awesomeness.

An interview that gives some insight into Steve Jobs’ greatness. This is what’s possible when design comes first!