Know Before It Happens

5 Signs a “Brand Collaboration” Is Actually a Scam

Not every DM that opens with “we love your content!” ends the way you think it will. Some end with you shipping a product to a stranger, editing for free, and never hearing back. Here’s what to watch for before you say yes.

1. Payment is “exposure,” “gifting,” or “future paid work,” never a number

A real brand can tell you what they’re paying, today, in rupees. If every answer about money gets deflected into a promise about what happens next time, there usually isn’t a next time.

2. They want the content before any terms are settled

Usage rights, timelines, and payment should be settled before you shoot, not negotiated after they already have the file. Once they have the content, your leverage to negotiate anything drops to zero.

3. There’s no company you can actually search

A real brand has a website, a GST number, an office, colleagues who aren’t just one person messaging from a personal Instagram account. If you can’t find the company anywhere except the DM you’re currently in, that’s the whole company.

4. The brief keeps growing after you’ve agreed

“Just one more edit.” “Can you also post this on Stories.” “Add these three hashtags too.” A scope that expands for free after you’ve said yes isn’t a collaboration, it’s an open invoice you’re not allowed to send.

5. Nothing is in writing, and asking for a contract gets brushed off

“It's such a small thing, we don't really need paperwork for this” is the sentence that precedes almost every dispute we’ve ever seen. If a deal is too small for a contract, it’s too small for you to have any way of proving what was agreed.

Ask for the deal in writing before you shoot a single frame, even if it’s four lines long. If a brand won’t put ₹0 or ₹50,000 in writing, they definitely won’t put a legal threat in writing either. Get a contract sorted →

India’s AI-Labelling Rules, Explained Simply

India’s IT Rules now require what they call “Synthetically Generated Information,” or SGI, to be clearly labelled. Here’s what that actually covers and who it lands on.

What counts as SGI

Audio, visual, or audio-visual content that’s artificially or algorithmically created to look or sound real: deepfakes, AI-altered photos and videos, and voice clones. Plain AI-generated text isn’t covered.

What labelling means in practice

Not a small watermark buried in a corner. The content needs a label that’s actually noticeable, visual for visual content, audio for audio content, and platforms are expected to embed this permanently where possible, so it can’t just be cropped or edited out.

Who’s on the hook

The rules put the first layer of responsibility on large platforms (the ones with 5 million-plus Indian users), who now have to ask users to declare if content is SGI and verify that declaration rather than just take their word for it. But if you commission the work, whether you’re a brand or an agency, that responsibility doesn’t stop at the platform. It runs down your entire vendor chain, and “our freelancer didn’t label it” is not a defence that holds up.

How fast this moves

Takedown timelines are aggressive: 2 hours for high-risk content like non-consensual or morphed imagery, 36 hours for individual complaints, 3 hours for court or government orders. Platforms that don’t comply risk losing their safe harbour protection entirely, which changes how quickly they’ll act on a complaint about your content.

If you’re commissioning creative work at any scale, this is worth building into your standard contracts now, not after a vendor’s AI-generated clip lands you a takedown notice. See how we help with this →

The One Clause Missing From Most Freelance Contracts

Most freelance contracts we see get the basics right: payment, deadlines, sometimes even ownership. Almost none of them say a word about AI. That silence isn’t neutral, it works against the person who delivered the work.

Why silence doesn’t protect you

A typical contract grants the client broad rights to use what you deliver. Once that grant is signed, nothing stops the client from feeding your face, your voice, or your edited reel into an AI tool, unless the contract specifically says they can’t. Silence isn’t a gap that favours you by default. It’s a gap the other side can walk through.

What the clause should actually say

That the client cannot use your image, voice, likeness, or delivered work to train, fine-tune, or improve any AI tool, and cannot create AI-generated or synthetic content from it, deepfakes and voice clones included, unless you’ve separately agreed to that in writing and been paid for it. Not implied. Written down, in the same document that covers your fee.

If your existing contracts don’t have it

You don’t need to renegotiate every agreement you’ve ever signed. A Do-Not-AI Notice (DNA), issued alongside your work like a rights-reserved stamp, records this in advance without needing the other side to sign anything back.

We built a free, fillable version of exactly this notice. Get the DNA template →

What to Do When a Client Stops Replying on Payment

The work is delivered. The invoice is sent. And then, nothing. Here’s the order we’d actually follow, not the order most people follow out of hope.

1. Stop sending hopeful check-ins

“Hey, any updates on the payment? :)” doesn’t create a paper trail, it creates a pattern of you asking nicely and being ignored. Send one clear written follow-up instead, referencing the original agreement, the invoice, and the date payment was due.

2. If that goes quiet too, send a formal notice

A Payment Demand Notice is a written notice that gives a fixed window, usually 15 days, states exactly what’s owed, and spells out what happens if it isn’t paid. It’s usually the first moment a client realises this isn’t going to fade into silence like every unanswered chat before it.

3. Make interest part of the ask

Indian law lets parties agree their own rate of interest on delayed payment, and that includes a rate stated on your original invoice or quote. 24% per annum is a commercially reasonable figure to attach here, our free notice template already includes it, so you’re not calculating it from scratch under pressure.

4. If 15 days pass with nothing

Your options widen from here: the MSME Samadhaan portal if you’re Udyam-registered, a civil suit for recovery, or handing it to someone who can escalate properly. Most disputes never get this far. A demand notice that reads like it means it is usually the point where “let me check with accounts” turns into an actual bank transfer.

Already past the silence stage? Download the free notice →, or if it’s time to escalate properly, come talk to us →