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The Graphic Design industry is, in many ways, a unique industry. While designers are technically each other’s competition (in the purest business sense) they also form a fairly tightly-nit community. Two designers are more likely to help each other, than to go head-to-head in a flat out business duel. At least, that’s the way the industry has been for years. Until, that is, the invasion of chop-shop design ‘companies’ and the advent of $50 logo and design sites that have (for better of worse – we think worse) changed the GD landscape forever. Designers now find themselves facing an onslaught of cutthroat business practices whose practices and methods that serve to accomplish only one thing – to remove the craft and art from graphic design. Seems like getting design stuff done cheap, and fast, are the only things that matter. Which is fine, if you don’t care about the craft. The Internet has only made this worse. Search engines – the yellow pages of the digital era – are dominated by companies and sites that utilize flea-market tactics to muddy the waters of what is, and what isn’t, conducive to great design. Many clients are aware that there are better solutions than the $50 design job – they simply kind find them. If you’re visiting the TDC, no doubt you’ve been part of a discussion about that very thing. Just like we had over the cups of java. We started to realize that every forum has one, or more, axes to grind. Either promoting something other than the forum, or featuring advertising from the very same businesses that, it could be argued, were hurting the graphic design industry. Often, it seemed that forums were at cross-purposes. Others were SEO manipulation schemes. Other seemed to be around just to ‘pimp’ Google ad words. That’s all fair enough, but we wanted something a little cooler. No blinking, flashing ad banners. No ‘spammy’ drive-by ‘design my logo for $50’ posts. A site that wasn’t ‘editorially restrained by the promoters and advertisers of same. And more importantly, a web site by designers, for designers and by designers. Not namby-pamby art school bollocks, but real world stuff. The nuts and bolts of the design business. And information that will help designers make their living in their chosen field. We came up with a battle plan for helping designers help themselves (see The Design Cartel manifesto for more info). To share the best of information and techniques. To inspire. And more importantly, to take back a little of the design landscape. Lofty ideals? Perhaps. But, in the minds of two lowly graphic designers a worthwhile goal. Hell, you may not even like the idea of a Design Cartel (we’ve had a few criticize us for the name). And that’s fair enough. You don’t have to participate. That is the true democracy of an Internet entity. For those of you who do like the idea, we’ll do our best to grow one of the coolest destinations for designers on the web. We don’t expect to change the world. We hope to make it a little nicer place – for designers of all levels. When it's all sad and done, do we have have our own axes to grind? Of course. We make our living in graphic design and want to promote our businesses as much as you do. However, that’s not the point. The TDC admins and mods will remain relatively anonymous (though many forum users know who we are). Using our TDC alter egos, our job is to grow the TDC. We’re not in this for ego (other than the ‘Kilroy was Here’ aspect) hence the Mr. Red , Mr. White, etc. handles. We are not in this to ‘pimp’ our own businesses – other than the promotional aspects of the TDC that are open to everyone. We're also pragmatic enough to realize that operating a site like the TDC requires resources, so we will offer a limited sponsorship program. We'll even have a marketplace and sell some books. But these are not the 'whys' of the TDC. Simply put, we built The Design Cartel because we thought it would be cool. And it seems, for the short haul anyway, no-one else is going to do it. And that’s probably the best reason of all. Does all this make The Design Cartel different from other graphic design boards and forums? Quite frankly - who cares. We didn’t create the TDC to be different. We created the TDC to be a site that we would have liked when we were first starting out. And as long-in-the-tooth veterans, a site that we’d still think is cool. We’re not setting out to steal anyone’s thunder. We’re not out to corner any market. We see the TDC as a ‘hub’ to the graphic design world, rather than the destination itself. And at the end of the day, we may only have a few members. Or thousands. It doesn’t really matter one way or another. Our only real mission statement is to create a web site and forum that graphic designers, of all levels, can find a little useful in their day-to-day lives. Welcome to The Design Cartel. Mr. Red & Mr. White.
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Owned and operated by PixelWurx Inc.
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