I have been contacted by a company in the States who discovered my online portfolio and they liked my style of design which is similar to their requirements. They asked if I would be interested in some possible UI design work for upcoming web app projects. I replied and said it sounds great, and after giving a quote, which they then agreed to (not formally, just an agreement over emails), they gave me a short brief what they want, and asked if I could "play around with it a bit" to see what I could come up with. I never laid any kind of hint that I would agree to design on spec.
I have designed on spec before, but the company I did this for are a local business who are my boyfriend's company's client, so I know they are reputable and reliable when it comes to payment. However, I'm a bit sceptical about spec designing for this overseas company. Am I being a bit too sceptical, do you think? Should I request that a contract is signed to agree on the work being carried out, quote, etc? Or is a watermark/copywright on the image protection enough?
Any comments or suggestions or advice would be really helpful. Thanks!
I am with hostingzoom.com - they are based in America, but don't let that put you off, they are a very good hosting company, they charge very little for a sizable amount of space and bandwith. They are quick to respond to email enquiries, in the time I have been with them (2 years) they have had downtime just once, and it was only for 20 minutes.
The same company also runs resellerzoom.com - which is the package I use, as I host other websites. Ideal if you want to host your clients websites.
