November 20, 2007

Editors & Orphans

When Editors Assume...

Hi Angela,

I have to say that Idetect quite a bit of hostility towards editors in these two postings. In "Letters," Mr. Barnes clearly has reason to complain, but he seems to want to paint nearly all editors with the same brush. For one thing, these awful policies are usually set by publishers, not editors. Second, there are manyfine editors out here working as hard as they can to make sure writers get their due--as a writer, you need to work hard to find them, unfortunately. I'm an editor and a writer, and as the former, I often go to bat for authors who deserve more than my employer is willing to give. Let's be sure we acknowledge those of us who try to do our honest best. Those who work by deceitful means, as Mr. Barnes suggests, really don't deserve to be called editors anyway.

And yes, of COURSE writers have to watch out for themselves when taking on assignments! Who else will do it for you? Which brings me to "When Editors Assume." If you ask me, the author is the one who made an assumption in this case. I would never in a million years submit a manuscript without having a contract in hand, and I'm sure most writers would agree. It's madness to do otherwise. I've even written for my sister's company (she is also an editor) and have required her to provide a contract before I even sat down at my computer. The publisher in the letter you postedis not completely innocent, of course--obviously the company was trying to avoid payment. But it's up to the author to make sure the terms of work are clear before investing time and energy in a project. Would you take ajobin an office, for example,without firstagreeing to a paycheck?

Thanks for taking my comments, Angela, and as always, thanks for all you do.

Best,
T. DeAngelis

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I am writing in response to "When Editors Assume" posted in the Letters to the Editor on November 14, 2007.

I researched numerous magazines through various sources and finally selected one for an article I had just finished. I sent the manuscript to the magazine publisher with a cover letter stating that I was selling publishing rights to the article. If the editor liked the article, she could purchase the publishing rights. The editor sent me an email stating she loved the article and planned to run it in their next edition. However, she made no mention of paying me for the article.

I re-contacted the editor and reminded her I was selling publishing rights to the article. The article was not a donation. And, she could not use the article without paying for the publishing rights. I should also note that this magazine was listed on three separate sites as a paying publication.

The editor re-contacted and was quite upset that I was insisting on being paid. She further informed me that she never pays writers because she is furthering the "Arts" by publishing articles in her magazine. She also claimed she knew nothing about her site being listed as a paying market for writers.

I withdrew my article.

S. Patrick Culshaw

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Orphans International America Needs Writers to Pitch Articles About Them

Hello Angela,

We are a small, very small, orphans charity with a number of interesting twists that publications and their freelance writers may find interesting. We are all volunteer here, and not writers, yet we just got paid $1200. for a story that ran Monday in the NYT.

First One Orphan, then Many More

It took us forever to write it. Now we believe that other media may be interested. And Willow Bay has put us on the Huffington Post. We can't be doing this writing stuff, we have to fund raise and run orphanages in three countries. Help!! We need freelance writers.

We would be happy to cooperate with any writers that want to do stories about us and they can, of course, keep the money that the publication pays them. How do we let your forum readers know? We realize that there are a million angles, since Jim has spoken at the UN, the kids are disaster victims (tsunami, hurricanes, HIV/Aids), and Jim Luce's own "NY wall street banker gives it all up" story.

We really need some help here. And I have had 3 people in the last 2 days come forward with publications they write for...Parents, USA Today and I forgot the other.

Get the word out if you can. My info is below. I am in desperate fundraising mode from now till Dec. 31. Your help would be appreciated.
Thanks

Linda Stanley, Assistant Director
Orphans International America
Associated with the U.N. Dept. of Public Information
540 Main Street #418
New York, N.Y. 10044
linda - at - oiww.org
http://www.oiww.org