6 simple steps for starting your freelance writing blog
In the past week I heard from several writers who are thinking about starting a blog. Bravo! Now comes the hard part. There are all kinds of reasons for blogging: building a brand, practicing different types of writing, promoting a book, putting your resume and clips online, or just getting stuff out there that you [...]
Time out: why writers need to unplug on the weekends
If you use rechargeable batteries you know they don’t last forever. They work, they run low and then you recharge them. Writers are like that too. We can’t work non-stop without the juices running low. But if you’re like me and you spend your work life tied to a computer, email and the Internet, it’s [...]
I'm in a New York state of mind
I’m in New York today meeting with editors. In honor of the trip, here’s five media-related things I like about New York: 1. The New Yorker – My favorite magazine. From week to week, you never know what stories you’ll find – wild boars, smallpox, Seymour Hirsch’s latest Iraq war expose, a George Clooney profile. [...]
Freelance jobs site hosts "Idol" style audition for paid blogger gig
Freelance Writer Jobs is a popular Website for freelancers. Every day Deborah Ng and her staff cull information on new writing gigs from a variety of sources – Craig’s List, Mediabistro.com, other job boards – and post them online, along with a mix of comments and commentary on the freelance writing life. This week, FWJ [...]
Go online to get business cards in a hurry
I haven’t carried business cards for years. I normally work from home and when I meet people I ask to exchange email addresses, or to add them to my LinkedIn connections. Business cards just didn’t seem important. But I realized I might need them when I went to a Mediabistro.com media networking party a couple [...]
How to handle rewrites without wanting to kill yourself, or your editor
Rewrites aren’t high on my list of favorite work-related activities. The fact is, I hate them. Especially when an editor sits on something for a couple weeks then ships it back with questions. It makes me want to fire off an email saying “That was so five stories ago!” But rewrites are a fact of [...]
If you like blogging every day, try NaBloPoMo
I wish I’d heard of Eden Marriott Kennedy a month ago. Kennedy is the creator of National Blog Post Month or NaBloPoMo for short, a Website for people who’ve taken up the challenge of blogging every day. That should sounds familiar to regular readers of this blog, which I took through my own blogathon during [...]
NY Times, SF head list of top newspaper Websites
If the future of news is online, newspapers are still figuring out exactly what that means and the best way to go about it. That’s the conclusion Douglas McIntyre of 24/7 Wall Street comes to after analyzing 25 top U.S. newspapers’ Websites. McIntyre, editor of the financial news Website, gave A grades to only two: [...]
Making life work as a writer and mom
Today I’m guest blogging at The Urban Muse, Susan Johnston’s popular freelance writing blog. The subject is how to make life work as a writer and mom. Here’s a little taste: I didn’t set out to be a freelance writer. It’s the compromise I made in order to do it all, be a writer and [...]
News University offers online courses and Webinars
I’ve written before about online resources that freelancers can use or classes they can take to improve their writing or multimedia skills or learn new ones. One of the biggest sources of online classes is News University, a project of The Poynter Institute funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Since it [...]
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