Edinburgh Napier University

  Research shows a big knowledge gap in the freelance community, with 56.5% of freelancers not feeling well informed of their rights, 68.5% having issues with late or non-payment, and 57.1% relying on peer advice to solve issues relating to contract negotiations and ‘grey issues’ not easily resolved by a quick internet search, such as setting rates (Connell et al, 2022). However, creative freelancers tend to be community minded, with large online communities devoted to the occupational upskilling traditionally delivered by professional associations (Patrick-Thomson and Kranert, 2020). This interdisciplinary project involving academics from ENU’s Business School and School of Computing, Engineering and the Built Environment project leverages advanced technology to produce an app which solicits, aggregates and evaluates peer advice to provide creative freelancers with a database of rates, contracting and broader business advice.

To date we have received £5000 from the AHRC via Creative Informatics at the University of Edinburgh, which we used to (1) scope the opportunity, and (2) build a HiFi design prototype of the app. We have also received £1000 from ENU to undertake a more comprehensive evaluation of the design prototype. The British Academy/Leverhulms Small Research Grant funding will enable us to build the front end of the app and to pilot test it with a group of users, and to support the input of the project's advisory panel.