Here's the deal.
This site needs more news writers.
We do not need more people writing essay regarding their thoughts on whatever, we need news commentary pieces, like the ones which fill-up most of this site.
I have not put out a call for this before, as I don't have time to review submissions.
Then someone came up with the idea of putting an article submissions board on the forum. This was a brilliant idea.
Just want to be 100% clear here: what I need are people who want to be regular contributors to the site. It can be a minimum of 3 articles a week, and it can be up to 3 a day (until we start filling up), but I want regular news writers who are willing to make a regular commitment, not people who just want to write a random one-off article about some topic. We don't have time to deal with that right now.
So, here's what will happen:
- You find a current events article from a mainstream news site (it doesn't actually have to be current, because you are just demonstrating your skills)
- You follow the format that my news articles follow, using the quote system, adding your own commentary and images (copy the formatting of the front page articles as best you can)
- Post it on the submissions forum (you are welcome to submit more than one and actually that is helpful if you do)
- It will be publicly viewable, so other forum members will be able to comment and review and click the "like" button if they like it
- Staff will review
- If you are picked, you will be asked to submit three news articles over the course of a week
- If these three articles keep consistency, you will be given an opportunity to become a regular writer for the site
- You will be paid $14.88 per article
Anyone can submit an article, but we are definitely looking to keep quality. Humor and finding good memes is a big deal.
Basically, someone can make a living at this, or at least supplement their income. And it's really fun.
Style things:
- You don't have to copy my style, but it should be witty, punchy and simply worded.
- The last thing I want is a bunch of "woopdie doo look how smart I am, count the college words I used" pretentious crap.
- Sentences should be simple, paragraphs short.
- Stuff doesn't necessarily have to be funny. If you're not funny but you're a good writer, that's fine. It helps if you're not yourself funny if you are able to understand funny and so can find funny memes.
- Include as much media as possible - even in the example article. Being able to find good YouTube clips, images, gifs, tweets, etc. is a skill unto itself, and one that if you have it, you should demonstrate in your sample submission.
- The regular reader knows I experiment with a lot of different styles, but you are welcome to be some type of character if you want. For example, write everything satirically under a fake Jew name, or be a surprised normie character. You can also switch stuff up.
- Creativity is highly regarded.
Other points:
- There are no contracts or anything.
- I don't want any new ideas, I just want things that follow the existing model that we've created.
- You do not necessarily have to agree with me about everything, but I run a pretty tight ship and do not allow much diversity of opinion on the site.
- Probably, we are going to end up putting people on "beats," so if you are an expert in a certain area (topical or geographic), that is good
- I am also interested in cultural analysis, such as TV/film/vidya reviews.
- It's helpful if you have a previous blog you've written on, or at least a forum posting history, as this gives an idea of your consistency; but I understand some people will writing skills haven't published or haven't published in this genre.
- I understand that students and people with certain jobs will not be able to write during certain periods, that's fine - I just need commitment to do this for a reasonable period, as I don't have time to teach people to do things and then have them quit.
- If you are offended by anything on this site or think you might be in the future, do not apply.
- In the future, we may take one-off submissions, but we're not doing that yet.
- In the future, we may take hire regular "insight" writers for more serious stuff, but we're not doing that yet.