About This Competition
This competition celebrates excellence in brand and identity design, and serves as a “talent audition” to identify 5 designers that will be commissioned by USV to update our firm’s identity.
To participate, simply submit your best brand/identity design work from your portfolio for consideration by our panel of judges (Note: this is NOT a “spec contest,” just submit a past project that best exemplifies your brand/identity work). The top 5 projects will be deemed “winners,” and their owners will be invited to take on USV as a client, proposing a new identity for USV, with a $1,500 guaranteed payment for responding to the brief. If your initial proposal is selected, USV will provide an additional payment of $12,500 for the completed work.
Below you will find details on the selection process as well as background information on Union Square Ventures, our beliefs, and our approach to redesigning our identity.
Background: USV & Redesigning Our Identity
Union Square Ventures (USV) is a New York City-based venture capital firm. We invest in internet services that disrupt existing industries including media (eg Twitter), communication (eg Twilio), education (eg Codecademy), finance (eg Lending Club) and others (eg Etsy). You can find our entire portfolio here. The best way to get to know us is to read our blog and the blogs of our team members.
Central to our investing is the belief that the internet enables the creation of new networks that can replace traditional hierarchical organizations across the economy and society. Networks tend to be powerful because they are more resilient, more effective and more inclusive. Steven Johnson’s new book Future Perfect coins the term “peer progressives” to describe this position.
Most of our portfolio companies have some kind of network effect in which the services become more valuable for everyone as the number of people using them increases. We are also trying to use the network as much as possible for the day-to-day operation of Union Square Ventures. For instance, we use a completely open process for hiring new analysts. We are also facilitating networks among our portfolio companies by organizing in person meetings and online forums.
We’ve realized that the USV network has taken shape in new and exciting ways. Our network, including the portfolio companies and their employees, all produce a vast amount of interesting content across the web. There is tremendous value in surfacing this content, but our current identity and web presence ignores this, along with the growth of our organization.
This change has led us to consider the next stage in the evolution of Union Square Ventures. Just as USV.com launched in 2005 to facillitate a more open dialogue, we are ready to update our identity to reflect the scope and scale of today’s conversation.
To craft this updated identity that expresses our beliefs and core values (see below), we have decided to take a network-based approach by leveraging Behance’s design community to help get the job done! We encourage designers on Behance (a USV portfolio company), the USV network, and all Internet citizens to help us along. We need your support as we catalyze a new way of thinking around networks and society.
Our beliefs:
Our investments are driven by a set of core values and beliefs:
Individual and collective empowerment through networked connectivity.
When we’re connected to each other, we enable creativity, facilitate transactions, develop efficient marketplaces and promote person-to-person sharing.
The best long-term steward of a network will be the company that focuses on value creation for all its participants, rather than just its shareholders.
Etsy, a USV portfolio company, is an example of a company and a community that has made a public commitment to be a values-based business.
Networks open new channels for innovation and empower people to act by routing around traditional gatekeepers.
Kickstarter, another USV portfolio company, is a crowdfunding network for artists and creators that launched only a few years ago. In the last fiscal year, Kickstarter raised over $200mm by empowering creators to validate and fund their projects through a distributed network of small backers without the approval of an institution or grant committee.
Maintaining the neutrality of an open web is important to the growth of society.
Keeping the Internet a decentralized network of networks and maintaining the neutrality of its individual layers will be essential for access to knowledge and the spread of democracy.
Committing to protect and enhance the freedom for networks to form and operate.
We engage in policy that support networks and technology startups such that all companies are free to innovate, create new markets, and empower users in new and exciting ways.
To participate, simply submit your best brand/identity design work from your portfolio for consideration by our panel of judges (Note: this is NOT a “spec contest,” just submit a past project that best exemplifies your brand/identity work). The top 5 projects will be deemed “winners,” and their owners will be invited to take on USV as a client, proposing a new identity for USV, with a $1,500 guaranteed payment for responding to the brief. If your initial proposal is selected, USV will provide an additional payment of $12,500 for the completed work.
Below you will find details on the selection process as well as background information on Union Square Ventures, our beliefs, and our approach to redesigning our identity.
Background: USV & Redesigning Our Identity
Union Square Ventures (USV) is a New York City-based venture capital firm. We invest in internet services that disrupt existing industries including media (eg Twitter), communication (eg Twilio), education (eg Codecademy), finance (eg Lending Club) and others (eg Etsy). You can find our entire portfolio here. The best way to get to know us is to read our blog and the blogs of our team members.
Central to our investing is the belief that the internet enables the creation of new networks that can replace traditional hierarchical organizations across the economy and society. Networks tend to be powerful because they are more resilient, more effective and more inclusive. Steven Johnson’s new book Future Perfect coins the term “peer progressives” to describe this position.
Most of our portfolio companies have some kind of network effect in which the services become more valuable for everyone as the number of people using them increases. We are also trying to use the network as much as possible for the day-to-day operation of Union Square Ventures. For instance, we use a completely open process for hiring new analysts. We are also facilitating networks among our portfolio companies by organizing in person meetings and online forums.
We’ve realized that the USV network has taken shape in new and exciting ways. Our network, including the portfolio companies and their employees, all produce a vast amount of interesting content across the web. There is tremendous value in surfacing this content, but our current identity and web presence ignores this, along with the growth of our organization.
This change has led us to consider the next stage in the evolution of Union Square Ventures. Just as USV.com launched in 2005 to facillitate a more open dialogue, we are ready to update our identity to reflect the scope and scale of today’s conversation.
To craft this updated identity that expresses our beliefs and core values (see below), we have decided to take a network-based approach by leveraging Behance’s design community to help get the job done! We encourage designers on Behance (a USV portfolio company), the USV network, and all Internet citizens to help us along. We need your support as we catalyze a new way of thinking around networks and society.
Our beliefs:
Our investments are driven by a set of core values and beliefs:
Individual and collective empowerment through networked connectivity.
When we’re connected to each other, we enable creativity, facilitate transactions, develop efficient marketplaces and promote person-to-person sharing.
The best long-term steward of a network will be the company that focuses on value creation for all its participants, rather than just its shareholders.
Etsy, a USV portfolio company, is an example of a company and a community that has made a public commitment to be a values-based business.
Networks open new channels for innovation and empower people to act by routing around traditional gatekeepers.
Kickstarter, another USV portfolio company, is a crowdfunding network for artists and creators that launched only a few years ago. In the last fiscal year, Kickstarter raised over $200mm by empowering creators to validate and fund their projects through a distributed network of small backers without the approval of an institution or grant committee.
Maintaining the neutrality of an open web is important to the growth of society.
Keeping the Internet a decentralized network of networks and maintaining the neutrality of its individual layers will be essential for access to knowledge and the spread of democracy.
Committing to protect and enhance the freedom for networks to form and operate.
We engage in policy that support networks and technology startups such that all companies are free to innovate, create new markets, and empower users in new and exciting ways.
Rules
Selection Process
Step 1: Submit any project from your portfolio that exemplifies excellence in identity design (past work). Submission period for this stage of the competition: 10/10/2012 - 10/31/2012
Step 2: USV and some design-minded friends will select their “top 5” designers based on (1) the quality of the past identity work they submitted, and (2) the number of “appreciations” their project received from the community.
Step 3: The 5 designers that are selected will be invited to USV’s “Design Roster” to received a brief for a new brand identity for USV with a $1,500 guaranteed payment for responding to the brief. Starting 12/1/2012
Step 4: If the your proposal is selected as the best match among the 5 submitted, you will receive a $12,500 payment to complete the USV brand/identity work and will be credited for the work!
Only one entry per user is permitted. Your entry must be related to brand/identity design, or it will be removed.
Step 1: Submit any project from your portfolio that exemplifies excellence in identity design (past work). Submission period for this stage of the competition: 10/10/2012 - 10/31/2012
Step 2: USV and some design-minded friends will select their “top 5” designers based on (1) the quality of the past identity work they submitted, and (2) the number of “appreciations” their project received from the community.
Step 3: The 5 designers that are selected will be invited to USV’s “Design Roster” to received a brief for a new brand identity for USV with a $1,500 guaranteed payment for responding to the brief. Starting 12/1/2012
Step 4: If the your proposal is selected as the best match among the 5 submitted, you will receive a $12,500 payment to complete the USV brand/identity work and will be credited for the work!
Only one entry per user is permitted. Your entry must be related to brand/identity design, or it will be removed.
Awards
Round 1 will be judged by the USV team and designers from their portfolio companies such as Kickstarter, Foursquare, Twitter, Etsy and more.
During Round 2 five finalists will be selected to respond to a creative brief for USV's new brand identity. Each designer will be payed $1,500 to participate.
From these 5 finalists, one winner will be selected to complete the USV brand identity, receiving a $12,500 payment and credit for the work.
During Round 2 five finalists will be selected to respond to a creative brief for USV's new brand identity. Each designer will be payed $1,500 to participate.
From these 5 finalists, one winner will be selected to complete the USV brand identity, receiving a $12,500 payment and credit for the work.
ABOUT THIS COMPETITION
This competition celebrates excellence in brand and identity design, and serves as a “talent audition” to identify 5 designers that wil…
SUBMISSION PERIOD
Oct 4 - Oct 31