Sunday, May 31, 2009

Why give it away?

Professional writers often wonder why a professional writer would give perfectly good content away in a blog. Why not sell it to a newspaper, a magazine or a web site?

It's not as easy to sell stories to newspapers and magazines as it used to be. I've sold stories to web sites on occasion, too, but I don't know what's normal. There are too many writers out there willing to be a "professional" by writing for $1 a story.

Me? I need to write. I'm kinda like the woman in the Louis L'Amour book Conagher. The woman would write poetry or something short on a piece of paper or petticoat and tie it to a tumbleweed. Conagher or one of the other cowboys might find it miles away.

She needed to talk to someone, but there was no one. Only the wind on the grass.

I prefer to be paid for writing, but I've enjoyed my four blogs. They've kept me sharp as a writer, and they've forced me to edit my own copy. Hey, if you write about being a professional editor/proofreader/writer, you're going to be treated as such. Nearly every time I make a mistake, someone tells me about it. So I need to be careful.

Who knows? I may be able to rewrite, consolidate or morph some of this into a magazine article or even a book. Or, if I can get enough readers, I can make money off the blog directly.

To me, a writer/editor/proofreader gets paid for his work. It's not good enough to be published or praised. Payment makes all the difference.

And I do write and edit for a living. But sometimes I need to be heard, too. That's why I'm here.

Write on.

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ENTRIES FROM THE DOG BLOG

BLOG ENTRIES FROM THE AUTO RACING JOURNAL
(a book of great stories about the Intimidator)
(the book of great NASCAR stories)
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Friday, May 29, 2009

What Century is this?

I often see people write "19th Century" or "18th Century" or "21st Century." Why do they uppercase Century? Is a century special?

 It's part of an epidemic of uppercasing. I've recently proofread books in which Nearly Half the Words were Uppercased. That's often an example of a non-writer trying to be cool or someone trying to make his writing seem important.

 Miss Lula Mae Smith hit the Century mark today, it says in the newspaper. She turned 100.

 What Century was Shakespeare born in?

 She was born at the Turn of the Century. (Of course this makes us wonder which century is turning.)

 If you see a story about the movie studio 20th Century Fox, then century should be uppercased.

 Someone out there will probably give my an example why century should be uppercased; I half expect it.

 But most of the time, there's no reason to uppercase century.

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ENTRIES FROM THE DOG BLOG

BLOG ENTRIES FROM THE AUTO RACING JOURNAL
(a book of great stories about the Intimidator)
(the book of great NASCAR stories)
Posted by at 1 comment:
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