All throughout history, it’s consistently been considered unfavorable to, in any way, buy popularity or pay for attention. One example that always immediately comes to mind for me is payola in the music industry.

But in the design industry, it’s quite another story. There are countless design books, awards, contests, etc., that require you to pay a submission fee just to be considered, and not only is this not frowned upon, apparently, but designers are lining up to fork over the money for them.

How is this still a thing?

There are some things I’ve specifically not done, however, and…if given the chance to go back, I’d not do them again.

So, you’ve won the title of “Best Use of Paste, 2015” in the Society of Collage Designers Awards. You paid your $90 submission fee (times however many projects you sent them), and now your name gets to live on forever on the society’s website (or for as long as it exists). There’s probably not enough room to present every winner’s work alongside their name, but at least everyone will know your name now.

Then, in a stroke of genius, you submit your 10 best logos to your favorite logo book contest at $10 a pop, and whoa, two of your designs make the book! Of course, you’re out the money for those other eight, but hey, one out of five ain’t bad.

Now, think about all the site traffic the collage society gets in a month. In a year. Think about how many copies of that overpriced logo book were probably sold. Now combine all of those, and how do you think that level of reach compares to, say, the number of people that have viewed the latest posts on sites like Under Consideration or Grain Edit — today. Those posts that the subjects paid nothing to be featured in.

Or, maybe you’re not in it for the exposure. So let’s think about what’s left. Something impressive to put on your resumé? Are you really still using a resumé?

In the age of the internet and social media, there’s really nothing these tired avenues of achieving notoriety can do for you that you can’t do yourself for free.