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Blogger Claiming Newspaper Rip-Off Goes on Video Attack

I came across this story on Bloggasm, a blog by Simon Owens focusing on new media and online journalism. A freelance writer and blogger, Tina Dupay, sent a column via email to the Tampa Tribune, which...

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Mediabistro and the Reputation Economy

You’ve heard of the New Economy. You’re heard of the Old Economy. There’s the Freemium Economy and the Link Economy and, as everyone knows after the past year, the Crashing Economy. But now we have a...

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Freelance Writing Versus a Freelance Business

I think part of the reason for the ongoing debate over working for what I've come to call writer mills is a gulf of understanding. However, I think the gulf is actually one-sided. The gap isn't between...

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Google Fast Flip as the New News Stand

Google has released into beta a new service called Fast Flip, which provides an intriguing approach to making news media work on the web. I'll point you to my post on BNET Technology, which also has...

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Writer Mills Making Money on Articles

I've gone on at length about the money that Demand Studios has made off paying writers a pittance. But payment gets far worse at some of the other mills. However, it doesn't mean that those companies...

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Checking Language at the Door to a Story

A colleague of mine, Laura Laing, who writes at times for the blog of the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association (NLGJA), posted yesterday regarding coverage of South African middle...

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DOJ Shoots Holes Though Google Book Settlement

If any one business dealing represented the potential to reshape media, it’s the Google Books class action settlement. The agreement has received some heavy criticism, though, clearly, the publishers...

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Analyze the Web Site Before Paying the Ad Money

PageOneLit.com will say that it's:# 1 Literary Newsletters Website out of 1,770,000 (GOOGLE)# 3 Newsletter Website search out of 90,200,000 (GOOGLE)# 9 Author Interview Search out of 4,000,000...

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Another Writer Mill: AllVoices.com

I'm mostly going to point to Angela Hoy's post about what appears to be yet another writer mill: AllVoices.com. An important point she makes is about minimum pay-out numbers. As most writers don't make...

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Writer Mill AllVoices.com Answers

The following came in as a comment on my post about AllVoices.com being a writer mill -- that is, wanting writers to provide content for little to no money. But I wanted to address it more directly, as...

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Interesting Source for Multimedia Training: YouTube

Clearly a business like YouTube thrives on the freely uploaded entries of people (though there are some sorts of revenue sharing deals available, as I understand). But instead of seeing it as a video...

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The Deadline Theme Song

As I'm under the gun on a project, here's a video clip of Steely Dan performing "Don't Take Me Alive" for all my professional brethren under the gun with the deadline police outside, megaphones...

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Questex Files for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy

B-to-B publisher Questex filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy. It handled publications in a number of industries, including "technology, telecommunications, beauty, spa, travel, hospitality, leisure, home...

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Wired on Demand Media

I've covered some of the financial background of Demand Media and its writer mill, Demand Studios, but I'd strong suggest that people also read this article in Wired. It looks at the operational model...

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HP Competes with Google on Books - Only Smarter

Hewlett-Packard, which, aside from PCs, is a giant in imaging, is taking on Google on the book front and has thrown the gauntlet down via a partnership with the University of Michigan, one of Google's...

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Be Wary of Intelius People Search

I've mentioned Intelius at times as one place to pay for more extensive information on people than you might get from free Internet-based services (though depending on what you need, spending any money...

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Gresham's Law of the Web: Crap Content Quashes Quality

This is actually a link to a post I did on BNET a couple of days ago. People have asked me what damage writer mills can really cause. Here's my answer - and it's a much bigger picture than how much...

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Google Books Expands to Magazines

Scanning paper is scanning paper, so there should be little surprise that Google has already moved past just books and gone into magazines. (Thanks to Randy Hecht for pointing this out to me...

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Keeping Up With Media Law

The law moves slowly - as it should. Whether common law or statute, you want relatively stable rules of the road so you can live your life and do business with some degree of predictability. And when...

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8 Points to Smarter Client Contracts

A friend and colleague recently asked me if I had a contract template that I used for clients. I said that I didn't because my contracts are generally heavily tailored to the specifics of an...

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Workflow:Writing Snagging Writer Blogs Without Permission [UPDATE]

There's a site called Workflow:Writing that has a list of blogs about writing. Although I can't speak to all in that long list, I heard from one, on a writers' board, who had until recently been on the...

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Google Bowing to Pressure of Paid Content

Google is the poster child for those who want to claim that free content is the future and that everyone has to give away what they produce to court “eyeballs” and the advertising they can generate. So...

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Time Inc. Wants to Charge You to Pay Promptly [UPDATED]

Writer colleague Dana Kennedy passed this information on, and even if you don't write for any of the Time Inc. properties, be prepared for a blood pressure boost. As Gawker reports, Time Inc. is...

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NBC Universal and Nielsen Want Your Money, Too

Just the other day I mentioned how Time Inc. wants you to take less money for prompt payment. Well, Gawker, which wrote about the first issue (and eventually noted that while one freelancer claimed...

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Designer Paul Rand's Client Philosophy Explained by Steve Jobs

Something on Twitter pointing to some blog led me to this 1993 interview with then NeXT CEO Steve Jobs (between stints at Apple):He's talking about working with a famous graphic designer, Paul Rand....

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