I usually enjoy my brick and mortar job, but Monday I was toying with the idea of resigning. My earnings working at home have been up and frankly I was annoyed with some things that were going on in the office.
At 2pm, Monday, April 5th, 2010, I logged into eHow and promptly got a message saying the Writer Compensation Program (WCP) was closing. My heart sank! I went to the forum to see what was going on and I learned that we had one week to publish on eHow through the WCP.
After 1 week, some writers would be able to publish eHow articles through the Demand Studios website, but that was only if you were approved. I got very nervous because I've been rejected by Demand. In fact, Demand Studios is one of the few places that has every rejected my application as a writer. I was trying to figure out what to do next, when I got the preapproval email to write at DS. Thank goodness! They based the approval on your track record as an eHow writer.
I logged into the Demand Studios workdesk and began checking things out. I learned that we now have to submit sources with our work and our articles will all go through an editorial process. I write for other sites that have an editorial process. I can't say that I am crazy about the idea, but I realize that it will cut down on the number of errors in the articles. For those that don't want to publish through an editor, Bright Hub and Squidoo have the highest residual payments I've found without an editor.
Back to eHow, I was still a little nervous and gulping down Easter candy when Julie from eHow called me. She asked if I had any questions. I asked about the new payment structure and whether the eHow forums would remain open. She said the residuals we would earn through the DS publication tool would be equivalent to what we were earning at eHow's WCP. She also said the forums at eHow would remain open and they were also planning some advances to the eHow community. Great! She also mentioned that the publication tool at DS was soooo much better and they were simply tired of fixing the broken one at eHow. She said it was like doing surgery on a 90 year old patient. He He.
I have to tell you I still feel a little sad. Why? Because I know the changes mean I will have to work my butt of to publish an eHow article, just like I do at other places I write with an editorial process. No longer can I slap up a quick piece of 20 minute work and earn a tidy sum of money. Yet, as I write that I know it was wrong to try to churn them out quickly anyway. I probably should have been going the extra mile all along and making my eHow articles just as good as I will now be forced to make them. :)
Honestly, I'm just so grateful to still be able to write for eHow. I do love that website.
5 comments:
Are you saying that it's okay to post crappy editorial online? I think you are a great example of why eHow scrapped their platform. I can also understand why DS rejected your work. Those of us who write for DS and have our articles published on eHow are embarrassed by unqualified writers who bring down the quality of our work.
No, I didn't say that it is ok to post crappy editorial online. I didn't say that at all. Also, DS has never rejected my work. They asked me to write for DS because of my high approval rating.
The biggest challenge for eHow in the months ahead will be smoothing out unnecessary conflict between DS and eHow writers. I see no need for it.
I'm responding to this statement, "No longer can I slap up a quick piece of 20 minute work." I churn out between 5 and 10 DS articles each day. It takes me at least an hour to write each one. When i'm researching online, I won't even click on articles from Hub, Suite 101 or eHow because I know how sloppy the work is. It seems like you're confirming that for me.
It is easy to write quickly when the topic is something you know well, That was actually the greatness of eHow, everyday people could write based on their expertise, NOT research.
I have written many places that has the DS structure. A title is offered. Writers choose it. They research the topic and they churn out content based on their research. Writers may, or may NOT, have any personal experience on the subject in which they are writing. They have been hired because they can eloquently string together sentences and draw in a reader.
I have balked at many pieces of researched web content because the writer obviously had no idea what they were talking about. I have seen this in happen in USAToday, so you will have a difficult time convincing me that professionalism, as a writer, is more indicative of quality content than expertise in a field. My favorite magazine, "Mother Earth News," regularly features submissions from people with loads of life experience and NO professional writing experience.
Also Riki, as a fellow writer for DS, I know that you do not look at those websites because you cannot cite them when submitting your work to the editors. This is the DS policy because the sites are competitors, NOT because the articles there are low quality.
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