Better Free than for Cheap
500 Words on Thursday | Written by Lee Schneider
It’s better to work for free than for cheap. How’s that? Here are some examples that seem stranger than fiction.
Had an argument with your spouse? Whip out your iPhone and launch “Fix a Fight,” available for $9.99 from the iTunes store. No expensive therapists, no tense appointments with marriage counselors. Just the two of you and your handheld devices. Sound like fiction? “Fix a Fight” is real.
Demand Media is a “content farm.” They’ll pay you six bucks an hour or so for an article they turn around and sell to USA Today or maybe run on Lance Armstrong’s site Livestrong.com. If you make a film for Demand Media they will post it online and you can have what’s left over on the executive editor’s lunch plate. Sometimes it’s pretty good, like half a sandwich or something. Demand Media’s low pay makes professional writers unhappy, but Demand Media is real.
You can send yourself or anyone else an email from the future. Go to futureme.org and write a promise or wish, address it to anybody and date it for sometime in the future. It will be delivered when you are much older than you are now. Futureme.org is real and it’s also free.
Want a video of your company president explaining why your oil rig blew up? Pixability will send you a flip cam in the mail. You shoot some video of your guy apologizing to sea turtles or whatever, then mail back the camera. Pixability edits the video and you put it on line. Cost: $395. Pixibility is real. Those production companies that used to charge $15,000 for similar services? They are now fiction.
By allowing their content to be factory farmed (like Demand Media does) writers are only hurting themselves. By posting their videos for free on YouTube (mostly to Google’s benefit) visual artists are being economically blind. There’s an ugly kind of genius to convincing clients to make their own videos and then charging them for it but that business model can’t make for a pretty picture. There’s a market rate for professional producers, and below that rate you generally get crap. By the way, is saving your marriage really worth only $9.99?
Strange truth: People work harder and value their work more when it is done for free instead of being done for less-than-adequate pay. Rather than play this game, chasing the ever-diminishing dollar amount for online content, I have to wonder: Might it be better to stay away from Demand Media and the like? If you could, wouldn’t you choose to be paid well or else choose to work for free on deserving projects? Digital slavery doesn’t sound good.
Better to find the people who really value your work, whether that value comes from financial riches or in simple appreciation. Lance Armstrong has done lots of charity work for free. He’s been financially well-compensated as a champion. Do you think he’d consent to riding for $6 per hour? Why then would he expect writers to work at that level through Demand Media, which provides content for his site?
Now I’m going to send myself an email from the future. It’s free, but immensely valuable.
Photo credit: Indigotimbre via Creative Commons License.
Lee,
I was stunned when I found out how much Demand pays; the only people who could survive on that would be the “bullpens” of writers from India who work for a penny a word. I’d rather clean outhouses; would leave me with a cleaner feeling!
The ‘net has driven down writers’ fees–so many people losing their jobs in factories suddenly deciding that they’re “writers.” In ’92 I freelanced for Aetna–paid me fifty bucks an hour–writing time, research time, travel time, meeting time, lunch time. Oh yeah, and bathroom time (always brought my copy of “War and Peace” into the stalls).
Today–everybody is a writer and has a blog, generally packed with gripping information that wouldn’t make it into the church newsletter. I really thing I’ll make the move to something more lucrative; perhaps a “life coach,” or the latest incarnation: “life mastery consultant.” I’m pretty good at telling people what to do; I’d probably be better at it if they were paying me huge fees.
Bob
Great blog post Lee. You raise many good points. When working for free it’s ok to still expect something in return – hopefully the project is fulfilling to some degree – artistically, opening new doors, or that it leads to other success.
I was discussing this very topic yesterday with a friend, and she suggested that in this digital age, we should consider starting anew. Imagine you’ve just been dropped here with no prior knowledge of how the marketplace functions. What could we put in place now that will make it work for everyone? It needs to be a win-win scenario.
I’d like to invite you and your readers to a new blog I just started in which the first post is relevant to this discussion – http://www.mozartwrotedinnermusic.com.
And btw, a little info about Lance and how top cyclists make their living (which is meager for all but the top rider on each team). The winner of the Tour of California, the top event in the US receives a check for $21,000. The winner of the Tour de France receives about 700,000 Euros. Most races pay less than $25,000 and only the winner get’s the payday. HOWEVER, the winner will take none of it and give it to his teammates who helped him win. Ultimately, the winner get’s the glory, speaking engagements and endorsements – all of which are worth much more than the proceeds. That, is how Lance makes his money.
thanks, Joel, for commenting. I will check out the new blog, and thanks for making the cycling finances clearer.
Great post! (ran across your site via Twitter btw).
I used to write for Demand Media and have since stopped for various reasons (pay being one of them). The draw of Demand Media, I believe, isn’t so much about the amount of pay as it is about getting paid (period) to write about something you enjoy (which is really the ultimate goal for any writer). If you wanted to write an article on turning an Xbox controller into a taser then Demand would greenlight it and pay you for it. Granted, perhaps you could write such a thing on spec and hope for a bigger payday from some other resource but most won’t pass up an immediate payday for a possible one later.
I don’t advocate free work from anyone beyond charity or volunteer work unless you truly are passionate about it and/or see a great opportunity for payoff later (either financially or in the form of later work or connections for example) that cancels out any immediate financial compensation. The reason this sort of behavior by Demand and others goes on is because too many people are willing to work for free because they believe that throwing out a freebie now will hook someone into paying you well later. This is not the case and more often than not clients perceive free work as being lesser-value work (think about how suspicious you were the last time someone offered you a free service or free gift). People don’t value things they haven’t paid or worked for in some way and the same should go for the worker. If you work for at least some compensation it may not be a lot but you at least create the impression that you are someone who’s work has a true value to it and this, coupled, with more demand for your service is how you eventually up your price level.
thanks, Chris, for this thoughtful response. When working for a charity or as a volunteer there is a value … I sometimes call it “karma bucks” and others call it psychic capital. Bank of America won’t do much with it when you try to use it to pay the mortgage, but accumulating it is good anyway. Certainly, as you point out, we all need to honor ourselves and the profession of writing by being properly compensated for it. Glad you found the post on Twitter!