the fine folks at a list apart have a nice collection of horror tales from the world of stupid clients. a few samples:

Why is it that there seems to be an attitude that it is O.K not to pay creatives of all kinds for their work? I am sure I am not the only one who has heard this:

“Well, we can’t pay you, but it would be such great exposure..”.

Now when I approach clients about design, I don’t give them “options”, I give them one sample plus an explanation.

clients whose brothers best mates dog can do it cheaper

Why is it that…

the clients who spend the LEAST are the biggest pains in the ass!?

Lately, all the small businesses I work with are overly concerned with the fantasy of being a “top 10” site on the search engines. This used to happen in 1995), then it went away (for me). For some reason, it’s back.

One of the many problems we had was that the client couldn’t specify their design requirements clearly. One of our favorite quotes was “we want it in just one color – blue and orange”.

“Hi. I want a website. I have 18 target groups and 43 main goals for the site. Can you make it interactive, you know, that Flash thing? I won’t tell you my budget because you might use it up, but it’s less than the price of 1 ad in PoDunk News. The only reason my cousin doesn’t do it at home on his 486 with FrontPage is because he got a new sales job and doesn’t have the time. I’ve already outlined the pages for you, so I’ve actually SAVED you some time. Here’s a brochure. Will you give me a working demo on spec? I need to see something before I know what I want. Will it take more than a month? Let me know when it’s finished.”

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