In my never ending quest to make enough money to pay for dog kibble without having to relocate, I do a lot of different things. In addition to talking, writing, and consulting about video games, I also ghostwrite, proofread, and edit. I clean up resumes and write sample cover letters. I tutor. Copywriting is on the menu. Customer service is available. A friend of mine swears that my time beating on incomplete patch notes written in Swahili makes me a technical writer. In short, if the written word is involved, I’ll do it. The one thing I won’t do is lie, unless the result is clearly labeled fiction or satire.
And frankly, when all of that slows to a trickle, I’m not too proud to sign up with the various websites that act as text clearinghouses. If you think you are too good to do entry level work when no other jobs are forthcoming, you are either rich or an idiot. I am neither. The clearinghouses also pay on time without nagging and repeated invoicing, not that I am particularly bitter about that or anything.
But the clearinghouses get on my nerves, sometimes. Specifically, the clients. “500 words on (obscure topic), must cite sources, requires a professional, informative tone.” That’s all well and good – but that job is almost always rated at half a cent a word, at a clearinghouse that pays anywhere from half a cent to fifteen cents a word. In other words, the client could have paid professional prices, but instead he wants professional work at amateur prices. Two dollars and fifty cents for an hour of work from a pro with a specialized background, counting the research? Did the client even bother doing the math?
The gaming industry does this, too – “professional writer needed, five years experience with storytelling, compelling plot design, etc” and when the starting salary scares away everyone but the girl clutching her unicorn-bedecked dream journal, shrugs and hires her on. Or, um, “community director wanted, will coordinate global community efforts, design grass roots marketing campaigns, manage a team of ten, assist customer service and QA, and coordinate feedback from a user base of hundreds of thousands of people” and telling people during the interview that fifty grand would be a gift.
I know there’s a recession on, but y’all, you get what you pay for. Also, insulting people is silly, unless you’re intentionally fishing for suckers, because word gets around. Most of us are aware that the same job in pure marketing would pay a good twenty five grand more. (The extra kick in the ass here is that the job often REPORTS to marketing despite dozens of reasons to put the job in production, but they don’t call it a marketing director position in order to save money.) I’m looking at a job listing with the same requirements (but outside the gaming industry) offering ninety. So, yes, fifty is insulting, unless the employer is also offering tangible rewards outside the salary. For the record, a foozball table and free soda do not count as tangible rewards during salary negotiation.
At least freelance writers (the ones who eat regularly) are bright enough to smell a trap. That two dollar holler has been sitting on the board for a week now with no takers.
It would be awesome to see an ad that says, instead of “salary commensurate with experience,” something like “We would like someone to do this job for X amount of money. However, failing that, we will accept a drunken hobo for ten grand less. Pink elephants must be able to type at 85 WPM.”
There’s a reason I don’t do games journalism any more.
Always a pleasure to read.
Given that I’m doing a bit of freelance work at the moment – including writing – and I have that strong interest in community management and all… Yeah, I get you on this one.
This is a sad but true reality…maybe someday it’ll be better. We can only hope.
This is typical across many industries. I see it regularly in IT work with my Government clearance. Some days it amazes me how many places, looking for “experienced, cleared individuals” don’t understand that some of us currently make close to double what they are offering, and get offended when we laugh at them.
During a period of unemployment, I had to tell more than one potential job lead that, despite not working at all right now, what they offered did not meet me income needs, nor was it even close. End result, I have a good job that pays well.
Some days, you just gotta suck it up, eat the Ramen, and hold out for a real paying gig.
Preach it sister!
Its nice (and disheartening) to know that there are employed people stupid enough to offer sub-burger-flipping wages for technical work.
Integrity wins out in the long run – just stick with it!
Keep on keepin’ on. There are many jobs out there for your expertise in the MD/NOVA area… they would be lucky to have you on board. If anything you have strategic hire written all over you
(you can just reply to my address I listed to post if you want me to look inside my openings, we have 1100 across the country currently, very large amount locally)
The problem is that there are hundreds of people willing to write for free.
There was an article on “The Week” about this:
http://www.theweek.com/article/index/93866/Is_writing_for_the_rich
A brief “fair use” excerpt:
“By some lights, this a golden age for writers, who can launch a blog, post their views online and reap the rewards of community, commenters and cross-referencing colleagues. This is all true. In addition to expanding the audiences of experienced writers, the web has created a showcase for extraordinary young talent like Matthew Yglesias, Ben Smith, Marc Ambinder, Ross Douthat, and Ezra Klein. On the web, no bureaucracy makes them wait their turn, no dunderheaded editors hold back their talents.
“But for a host of other young writers, there is still the problem of getting paid. Newspapers are no longer an option. The New York Times pays $300 for an op-ed piece today, less than it did a decade ago—and it wasn’t real money then. With more than 1,000 submissions a week, The Times’ opinion pages (for which I’ve done short stints both writing and editing) really needn’t pay anything at all.
“After all, the number of people willing to write for free is vast. In 2007, I was in charge of recruiting writers for the expansion of The Huffington Post. I calculated that I would need 75 unpaid blog submissions per day, Monday through Friday, in order to make the site work. That target seemed absurd at first. Yet within two months, hundreds of willing bloggers had signed up, the majority of them credentialed authors published by major publishing house.”
Just to build on what Calarius said, my experience has been to turn down a “below fair rate” job is better than taking it. Many times they simply don’t understand what the rates are, or don’t value the work – you might change that but the cost of your time is better spent looking for a job elsewhere. It also helps if you don’t mind ramen every now and then.
Wince. Way to brighten my day, Yoz.
I will, weakly, argue that published writers have motivation to do high profile projects, heavily promoted projects, for free – they need to sell books. And the credentialed author is probably not sitting at text clearinghouses writing exciting articles about why you should buy a particular sort of charcoal grill, or coming up with Ten Reasons To Lighten Your Hair for an overburdened editorial assistant at Elle.
“Street Cred” is always acceptable compensation, as long as you know that you are actually going to get some. Sometimes taking a high profile job as a way to get a foot in the door to better paying gigs is ok, as long as all parties understand this. But someone who has the credentials and work experience shouldn’t be expected to take sub-par wages simply because “the job is worth it”.
IMO, any employer who plays up the worth of the work, but can’t put up the money to hire the talent, gets exactly what they pay for.
(as a side note, I should remind readers here that the US Government works on the basis of lowest bidder…most times)
My girlfriend says her dream journal has BUTTERFLIES not unicorns, thank you very much.
*raises hand*
I have a question: what are these “text clearinghouses” that pay for writing work, and where do I find them? Apparently that’s not a common enough tag for them to show up on Google using it. I and several friends are fair to good writers, and sure wouldn’t mind some extra cash on the side for writing work.
Sanya, how does one become a proofreader? This unemployed computer tech would love to know.
I hear you on the salary front. I have interviewed for several jobs in the game industry and it always surprises me to see how little they are willing to pay for something I’d pour my soul into.
$50k? The correct answer is WTF. Well, sure, if I can work from my home and not move. I can do that. The cost of living is comfortable here.
Having peeled all the unicorns off my binder a few decades ago, I am no longer willing to share rent with three other losers in a crappy apartment just to make ends meet AND devote 60+ hours a week to a “career”. Being married and having 3.5 dogs to my name has something to do with this, of course.
I had one interviewer tell me that I may have unrealistically assessed my worth when we discussed salary. A month or so later, I saw who they ended up hiring and grinned into my beer. You really do get what you pay for… and what they expect from the hireling is, well… unrealistic.
So it’s comics, maps and visiting Sanya here while I have all this time on my hands. Pass the bees, will you?
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Brasse