Journalism; when is it justified for a writer to work for free?

To the tune of: Pete Seeger – Casey Jones

The Controversial Bit: yesterday morning, I posted on Twitter the following:

Hypothesis; people who write for free are using their secure financial situation as an unfair advantage. Any antitheses?

Notably, all the aspiring journalists I know were shocked that I asked this; most wannabe writers do work for free, as do most people in most fields that are difficult to get into but have (apparently) low skill criteria. Xero said “140 characters or less leaves no space for me to write why that’s so incredibly off the mark and kind of insulting… I’ve written for “experience” for 3 years and had a full time job so I can afford to. I’m not rich. I’m desperate to get in.”

I know of people who’ve worked for free for months to get into, say, publishing, a median-wage profession with middling skill requirements. Notably, fields that need to find high-quality candidates amidst a sea of dross are more likely to support paid placements and internships (the law, say); those that have lots of suitable candidates can afford to exploit them (publishing, journalism).

However, writers writing for free to get into the industry aren’t the issue, though it’s interesting how this critique is applied to them.

The boring bit: Let’s think about journalism as a market, with a very few editors able to buy work. There are large numbers of writers supplying work, which would drive down the price of work to zero; this has been caused by a reduction of barriers to entry: networks, access, tools, literacy, relevant degrees, languages, etc. These barriers are going to decrease and increase supply further, over time.

However, there are criteria that these editors need in their work which narrow the market; timeliness, quality, humour, analysis, reliability, accuracy; let’s refer to writers who fulfil these criteria as ‘talented’. If a publication had no criteria, the editor could literally employ anyone, though it’s unlikely he’d end with anything that was any good.

Now, it is likely, (as evinced by the huge number of acerbic wits on, say, RockPaperShotgun’s comments threads) that there’s a huge over-supply of potential talented writers. However, it’s a rare editor (normally an overworked writer himself) that has time to hunt down these writers and train away their flaws; so until someone comes up with an algorithm or crowd-sourcing solution that outperforms an editor in finding talent, they have to work with writers who have established their talent.

Erik Johnson argues that “Compensation brings about a type of consistency from a writing staff that a managing editor can trust much more than free help. As long as companies see the clear ROI when employing paid writers vs. unpaid, I doubt there will be a significant decline” (in paid writer’s rates).

So how do you prove talent?

Starting out: To establish yourself in this market, you need to train on smaller sites or on your own blog, working for free, to improve your writing and profile, then submit your portfoilio to larger media; smaller websites are a good idea, as even if they don’t pay, you’re more likely to get noticed. As Debbie Timmins put it “People who write for free are honing their skills in the hopes that someone, someday will think it’s worth paying for.” Simple, right? No-one argues with their commitment to sacrificing time to establishing themselves. Martin Gaston agreed; “there is absolutely no chance I would have ever got a job without working for free.”

(If you want to know how to establish your talent, lots of people have written “How to get into journalism” pieces.”)

Who can write for free? To write for free, you need some other means of supporting yourself. Often, for writers starting out, that means living at home with mum and dad, but the free time and state support of academia are also good; being independently wealthy is best of all. Those, like Xero, who work at a job as well as writing are somewhat rarer, if only because 9-5 jobs are excellent at leaving you unmotivated and jaded enough to put a severe cramp on your writing.

Basically, the larger your ability to subsidise yourself, the longer you can wait for success and the more time you’ll have to spend on honing your craft. As Benjamin White posited, “Rich people get experience for good jobs by virtue of being rich.” He’s missing out quite a lot of steps there, but we all understand the gist; basically, there isn’t equality of opportunity. When we talk about fairness here, then, we’re not talking about business being unfair; it’s about society having inequality built in from the start. Sad, but not much we can do it about it, and not particularly a problem of writing.

The established talent: So, the writer has established his talent. The key follow-up question is; when do you stop working for free?

Regarding writing for free, Michael French, editor-in-chief of Develop and MCV thought that “there’s a big distinction between that ‘for the trade/community’ stuff and, say, doing the same thing on a national (newspaper).” Inventor of games journalism, Kieron Gillen gave me a good answer: “Generally speaking, the difference is between writing for free, and writing for free when someone’s making money from you… When I heard there’s a national paper who does it, it makes me want to drop napalm on everyone.”

“With an extra alarm for any use of the word ‘exposure’ in lieu of pay,” said freelance-hero Richard Cobbett. He told me “On PC Plus, I had several people offer free work. My reply was always ‘if it’s worth printing, it’s worth paying…’ The only time it makes sense if you’re directly pimping something else, like a book or some cause… I wouldn’t pay a press release writer for reprinting their words either.” Ben Furfie, who worked for free for two years to build up a portfolio, said “Offering paying publications free work is stupid. If I wasn’t good enough to be paid I found out why then went back and worked on it, until I was good enough. Didn’t take long.”

Richard also posited that working for free often doesn’t get the writer the advantage he imagines he’ll get. Kieron agreed: “And if they do, they’ve fucked over everyone else to get it. In which case, fuck ’em.” Price at this level is, after all, not dependent on the individual’s skills, but rather on how low they’re willing to go to get the work.

The worst cut of all: Undercutting, that is pitching a lower price than the competition, is a related thorny issue. When there is no established freelance rate, pitching a price is not a problem; but I know of at least two journalists who’ve successfully undercut an established price for work in order to ensure a proportion of a given freelance budget for themselves.

Again, to Ben Furfie: “Why people try to undercut people is beyond me. You get what you pay for. It’s the reason why I split my $1000 feature budget two ways rather than three. I’d spend more time editing the poorly written copy than it takes me to write the third feature myself.”

Like free work, if a person is undercutting the rate established by the editor, then the editor has to ask themselves; “Do I want this person writing for my media, yes or no? If yes, then I believe their work is of sufficient quality and I should pay them the rate I’ve set to attract that quality. If no and they’re not good enough, then I shouldn’t be influenced by their lower price.”

The free worker’s justification: Chris Schilling writes for the mainstream newspaper The Observer, for free, though he admits he’s not in a secure financial position. “Originally it was a profile-enhancer. Now it’s just about the only way I get to review games I really want to write about. I wrestle with the pros and cons every week. I realise working for free isn’t just doing me few favours but others, too. I do like the opportunity of having a platform to talk up smaller games I believe deserve the exposure.” However, he knows if he stops doing it, someone else will take it up and he’s happy sacrificing his free time to this, rather than trying to bolster his income.

The conclusion we can draw from this is that the onus is not on the writer; they’ve not set up the moral trap. It’s the editor or the business that is doing something wrong – like interns this is, after all, illegal. (I believe the precedent is London Dreams vs Nicola Vetta, though I’m no lawyer.) To employ someone, for piece-work, without paying them is illegal – but the law is very badly enforced.

Is there anything to be done? Is there any way of shaming the publications into conforming with the law? Probably not.

As the BBC’s Dan Emery said “’exposure’ – hah – it’s just another word for exploitation and usually when cost is more important than content. It’s been going on ever since I started at PC Zone 20 years ago and it’s in most industries in some form.” Does he think we can shame publications into stopping? “In my humble opinion, when it comes to “shame” most business don’t care. Only when hit in their wallet do they change.” How about writers? “There’s no shortage of wannabe writers (or good writers needing a break) that think it’s their way in. For every one who wises up another three will fill his slot.”

Kieron agreed; “All you do is have the conversation. There’s a reason why I’ve said half the stuff I have in public. It’s just as much about shaming the writers who take it by saying; ‘You do know this is wrong, yeah?’”

Another vision: I asked Erlend Grefsrud of StrongMan Games whether the oversupply of writers was driving the unit cost of writing to zero. He replied: “Analysis is expensive, fandom is free. Enthusiast press is more vulnerable for that reason. You hire gushers willing to scribble for nothing, keeps everyone happy.” When I posited the unit cost of analysis also dropping to near-zero, along with all speed, quality, content, and assuming a huge over-supply of writers, he pointed out that advertising was the key shaper of writing style online. “Hm. I guess quality is less important than volume and speed. A function of the economics of advertising in transition phase.” So, fast, corpulent and overly positive coverage is the future of games sites?

Other countries: Dennis Kogel from Germany and Michael Tegos from Greece gave us their perspectives on other countries. Michael said “I can just add that I couldn’t have gotten my paid mag job if I hadn’t started off writing for free for a games site. Plus, things in Greece are such that it’s sadly all but impossible to write for a games site and get paid.”

Dennis added some perspective from being a freelancer for the German media. “As far as I can see, writers for “big” mags are paid well enough, small magazines…not so much (and they’re much smaller) but there’s a tendency to crowdsource news etc. on bigger sites and give readers a way to participate by blogging for free. There’s still a very palpable divide between reader-contributors and “proper”contributors which makes it weird in a way. However, online doesn’t seem to have a lot of respect in Germany generally. One major newspaper I wrote for doesn’t pay for online but promises carrot-on-a-stick paid print stuff. I stopped writing for them for that reason (though I’d love to find an outlet that pays for webcomic stuff).” Wouldn’t we all?

Rates: I’ll do a separate post later in the week with rates for various UK games media. Watch this space.

Stantonization: Richard Stanton of Edge said: “You know what happens when some fool asks me to write for free? This happens.”

Harlan Ellison – Pay The Writer

Contributors:

Comments (

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Duncan

July 25, 2011

I don’t think it’s really about getting money out of it, it’s about getting “something” out of it. That something can be profile, experience, free games, whatever. Everyone has their own personal judgement on what’s important to them, and if they get that from their writing then it’s worth doing. If not, it’s not.

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Craig Lager

July 25, 2011

I just want to throw in my 2 pence, I think I’ve got a situation that hasn’t been covered that’s very relevant.

I’ve been running GamingDaily for about 3 years. It started as a personal thing when I couldn’t write for shit, but evolved into whatever it is today: that is, a place where a lot of people have written for – for free – to then go on and work professionally (check out our Write For Us page).

So, while GD has barely ever produced any money so has never paid its writers, it has proven to be a good place for people to contribute to. It’s a portfolio with a reputation and high (I think) quality control.

Hell, if it wasn’t for doing that I would never have gotten a paid gig anywhere, and while this isn’t my career, it’s enabled me to get paid freelance work to replace the free work I was doing for GD, while still contributing to that when I feel like it or there’s something I want to review (alongside the endless Editor-type work I have to do).

Anyway. Rambling a bit, sorry. So, I think it’s fine to write for free so long as there’s value in it, and it’s not earning money for someone else.

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Richard Horne

July 25, 2011

Just out of interest, did you get paid for writing this excellent article Dan? 😛

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Richard Horne

July 25, 2011

And now a serious answer.

Similarly to Craig, I started my site in order to put my (then) newly learned PHP/MySQL skills into practise with a real life project. I’ve spent years working on the site, pretty much for nothing. My motivation being that if I ever wanted to write for a living or work for a popular gaming website, then I’d need something to distinguish me from the shit-tonne of other writers all clamouring for the same low-paid position. Writing for yourself for free, therefore, is wholly acceptable.

Also, one could argue that writing for the money, as opposed to writing as a passionate, enthusiastic response to something is cynical and calculated and leads to a writer simply going through the motions as opposed to writing with their heart on their sleeve.

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Dennis Scimeca

July 25, 2011

Some of the comments above are referring to self-publishing, which is not what this article is referring to. No one is suggesting that writing for free for your own side is problematic or a waste of time. The issue at hand is whether one should write for free *at an outlet that makes a profit or pays other writers* to which the answer should be a resounding “no.”

To Richard – one could also argue that writing passionate, enthusiastic responses can also very quickly, and usually does, degenerate into solipsism and self-indulgence. Professional writers don’t write for themselves as much as they write for an audience.

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Maria Vassilopoulos

July 25, 2011

I know of people who’ve worked for free for months to get into, say, publishing, a median-wage profession with middling skill requirements.- unlike journalism, for which all you need is a pen and a big head.

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Richard Horne

July 25, 2011

Dennis, I agree wholeheartedly with you. To answer your first point, I think maybe I did get the wrong end of the stick. Though having said that, I never once got the feeling that Dan was casting aspersions at what Craig or I do in our spare time as hobbyist enthusiasts.

To refer to your second point, you are again correct and I was making the latter point with tongue firmly in cheek. Though to take that discussion on another tangent, one could also argue that a lot of paid writers are actually increasingly likely to write for themselves as the fact they are getting paid for it leads to a sense of greater worth. “I’m getting paid for this therefore I’m entitled to get lost up my own arse.”

😀

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Funambulism | Journalism; when is it justified for a writer to work for free? | digital journalism tools and topics | Scoop.it

July 25, 2011

[…] Funambulism | Journalism; when is it justified for a writer to work for free? Hypothesis; people who write for free are using their secure financial situation as an unfair advantage. Source: funambulism.com […]

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James Pikover

July 25, 2011

I disagree with this on the premise that writing for free is, like all other potential jobs, killing the writing industry.

As individuals who started writing years ago, we didn’t have as much competition then. Writing for free 5, 10 years ago was like taking up an internship. No pay, some competition, but it wasn’t impossible to move up in the world. Over the last few years, that low barrier for entry and the ridiculously high number of new blood pouring in is leaving many of the current writers out of work. At least, in the US. Allow me to explain.

Writing for free is easy. Actually, forget just writing. Games journalism is easy. People have YouTube channels, blogs, websites, podcasts…whatever it is, it takes minimal time and effort to produce. The cost of production has decreased so much that even in this “terrible economy” anyone can afford at least one game console of their choice and all the hardware and software to make content. At first, this sounds great! Everyone can contribute, and capitalism will succeed in allowing the best content to earn the most money!

But, as much as I wish that were true, it doesn’t quite work like that. It’s not like an old-fashioned marketplace where the guy selling the freshest fruit will be known throughout town. The internet spawns affection as easily as it spawns hate, and gamers are often the worst. A great, well written piece that may be found only by a few people could receive the worst venom because the reader disagrees with the points made. Now imagine that there are 50,000 writers with their own game sites. How the hell are we, readers and consumers, supposed to pick and choose which to read, go to, listen to, or watch?

Like all businesses, we listen to our family and friends, to marketing, to all those factors in life which point us to that pair of jeans instead of this other one without trying them on. If there were 10 starbucks right next to your house, all equally distant, which would you go to? What if there were 10,000?

Worse yet, as the capitalist system continues to work its magic by forcing those who cannot maintain their games journalism to close shop and go elsewhere, “hope” and, often, the promise of free games ensures that at least 5 others will take the place of the fallen. Eventually capitalism will make a balance…but with how long that will take, the rest of us likely won’t make it through the storm.

The reason I say that is twofold: firstly, most of us in the games industry got in one of three ways: right place right time, hard work, or connections on the inside. There’s no competing with luck, but who will a potential employer choose these days: someone who has worked hard for free to get a real job, or the dumb nephew of your coworker (or worse, manager) that just seems “perfect” for the job?

Hard work is no longer enough, and simply stating that writing for free will work nowadays is, in my experience, a crock. It did years ago, which I can attest to myself. I’m a product of such. But today, if you don’t have some special skill or trait, that little blog will be swept away by the tide of Google searches and tweets about how bad Duke Nukem Forever really was.

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Почему игровая журналистика в такой заднице | Sergey Galyonkin

July 25, 2011

[…] addthis_share = {"templates":{"twitter":"{{title}} {{url}} (via @galyonkin)"}};}Читал плач Ярославны в британском блоге про то, что проклятые школьники […]

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James Pikover

July 26, 2011

Also, I didn’t see that Harlan Ellison video linked earlier, but I saw that clip a few years ago and it changed the way I think about it. He’s absolutely right (and being a B5 fan, I took his word seriously).

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The Sundays Papers | Rock, Paper, Shotgun

July 31, 2011

[…] The ouroboros worm of the internet has no beginning and no end!Agent Dan writes about “when is it justified for a writer to work for free?” A good overview of the situation and circumstances involved.Robotic octopus arm is the […]

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Anton Gully

July 31, 2011

Re: 10000 Starbucks – eventually you’d form an opinion, from personal experience and recommendations from people you trust, about which was best. That opinion would likely be formed based on which Starbucks had the best management and staff.

If I were looking for signs that the writing is on the wall, so to speak, for paid gaming journalism, I suspect articles like this one would be a good indicator. And possibly not just gaming journalism.

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links for 2011-07-31 « Adam Englebright

August 1, 2011

[…] Journalism; when is it justified for a writer to work for free? | Funambulism […]

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Andy

August 1, 2011

While I don’t pretend to know the first thing about the economics of games journalism, or even anything about games journalism for that matter, what I do understand is capitalism. And under a capitalistic society, the main goal is to make money. Part and parcel with making money is saving money. What really caught my attention was Ben Furfie’s quote about the editor deciding between quality of work and paying or not taking the work accordingly. It seems to me that such a consideration falls only to those who truly care about the health of the games journalism business above their own economic health; I think a more relevant question, one which those responsible for purse strings must ask themselves all the time, is this: How can I get the best quality of writing for the least amount of money? And one answer is obvious: use free writers. In practical terms, this thought probably does not come into play often; for the most part, writers paid by a given outlet are likely to be just as good as, if not significantly better than, any writer plying their trade for free. But the fact remains that if an editor can achieve similar or better results for a lesser (or no) cost, it is in their personal interest to do so. Editors that save money and still sell content well are going to remain employed longer than those that bleed money.

I suppose I just find it naive to draw a dichotomy between paying writers or not using them at all; it makes no sense, from either a personal or business financial standpoint. As to the general health of the industry that uses free labor in increasing amounts, well, I leave those types of musings to the more qualified to opine eloquently. I just know that bottom line is the only line for the corporations that control and finance large segments of games journalism.

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MadTinkerer

August 6, 2011

“So, fast, corpulent and overly positive coverage is the future of games sites?”

Ha!?

Ahahahahaha!

WAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

The future? As if that hasn’t already been the case for the last ten-ish years? Oh my, that was funny!

I’ve got one: So the future of game publishing is a universal mandate for cranking out mediocre sequel after mediocre sequel? Oooh, another one: So the future of game development is obsession with making things ever prettier at the expense of everything else?

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Zeth

August 15, 2011

Finally getting around to reading this post. I must say it puts certain practices in to sharp focus and makes a few points that will need to be taken forward.

As for shame… corporations have no shame – they just have profit margins and stakeholders. unless one of those elements are impacted then very little will be done.

I learnt the hard way that your writing needs to be up to snuff if you want to take your freebie submissions forward. You take a few knocks and maybe resuscitate your ego a few times but you get there in the end if you persist.

Really enjoyed this article, keep up the work 🙂

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