An email was sent out recently by a well-established website who are seeking new writers to help them keep on top of the relentless flow of tidbits and news which fans might like to read. People applied to find out more, and received the following reply from the site in question – and I’m not going to play coy here, the site in question was HeyUGuys:
‘At the moment we’re looking for news writers to help us with the day to day running of the site. We don’t want to be churning out news to cover everything and anything but we are keen to get news to become a bit more prominent on the website. We don’t have huge amounts of cash to play with but we’re looking at paying around £1 per article. We hope that over the course of a month if we can do 2 or 3 per day it may add up to a tidy sum.’
Now, pick the bones out of that one. £1 per news item: two or three news items per day (probably around half an hour to an hour a pop, going on my own pace of writing) which could potentially lead to a whopping £20 or more per week. A tidy sum, indeed. Not only is the amount of money being offered here insulting and unliveable for anyone trying to sustain themselves professionally as a writer, I’m not even sure you could get away with it legally. Even if you were in the unfortunate position of having to supplement your existing wages in this way, it would hardly be worth the time and trouble. However, this email neatly encapsulates, for me, some of the issues facing fan writers in these times. Namely – should you write for free? Write for a pittance? Or hold out for better things?
The internet has led to a great democratisation of film writing, amongst of course many other kinds of writing; in many respects, this has been a positive thing. Film criticism is a massively active corner of said internet, and it clearly thrives on the immediacy and interactivity of the online forum. It provides the opportunity for many people to flex their creative muscles, gaining experience, engaging with like-minded souls and bouncing ideas off others, whilst potentially honing their own written style along the way. There’s the scope for lots of different styles and views to be accommodated somewhere – and there is certainly no monopoly on opinion being held by a limited number of outlets able to call the shots. Anyone who’s content to hoist their own thoughts and opinions onto a website does, I think, have an element of narcissism in their characters (self included) – why else would you want other people to know so precisely what You Think? – but along the way, it can be fun, you can meet people, start projects, see where it all takes you. I’m loath to use the word ‘community’ because rarely has a word been so co-opted and corrupted as this one has in recent years, but yeah, if you’re less squeamish than I am, you could even refer to it as such.
The thing is though, community or not, there’s a substantial number of downsides to this ever-growing plethora of sites and writers. In many ways, you could argue that the Brave New World doesn’t really exist. For one thing, there’s definitely still consensus on the web, even if it isn’t under the sway of a select few outlets. Every few years, the latest big thing or ‘hot new stars’ are fucking everywhere, whilst dissenting voices are either absent, drowned out or ignored. Causes take hold and are then replaced by new causes; everyone dives on those who seem to be transgressing expected behaviour – which, again, could be something as simple as not liking a film which everyone else likes – a cross between The Emperor’s New Clothes and Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Some of this, however, can be linked to basic misunderstandings which many who work in film have about fan writers – assuming them to be unpaid publicity, who should behave as employees, say the right things, but do so for nothing. Many fan writers do just that. No wonder jobbing writers find it so hard to get by; we have, of course, and again self included, probably made life even tougher for professional writers. Not through malice, but simply through doing what we do, and on occasion providing the prerequisite soundbites needed for the DVD cover, free-of-charge. The picture blurs even more when one considers that many pro writers also generate a lot of free content in order to keep on top of that most nebulous, necessary modern edict – ‘exposure’, staying ‘current’, often through blogs and guest spots.
So is £1 per news piece as draconian as it sounds, in light of all that? I would say that yes, it absolutely still is. Of course it is. See, once you begin to factor in money, or even the spectre of payment, then you enter a whole new arena, crossing from a conversation with writers who write for the pure love of it into a business transaction. If you offer cash, then you have obligations, as do your employees. Would HeyUGuys have attracted any bile had they simply advertised for new writers who wanted to give it a whirl for the first time, unpaid? I doubt it. When you cross the divide and offer cash, see, you’re thrust into a world of different obligations; the sum you offer will be held to scrutiny, first and foremost, and as such you seem to simultaneously recruit people who may depend on writing for a living, and then immediately mistreat them. I’m a hobbyist with a day job which thankfully pays the bills, as I have never personally received a single penny for writing or editing to date, be that online or print; however, I do remember a few years ago when a certain now-defunct UK horror print magazine were attempting some damage limitation after claims they were ‘sexist’: they wanted female writers, presumably to prove they weren’t sexist, and a mutual friend put my name forward. A small sum was initially offered, but it all fell flat when the magazine in question found out I wasn’t a London resident, and they decided they couldn’t afford the postage to send screeners out to me all the way up here in the North of England…this sort of thing really does sour the well, and I felt very irritated by it all, despite the fact that, ordinarily, I write for free.
So what’s the solution? Will the divide between the hobbyists and the pro writers widen further, or disappear? Will the love of writing for free and making it available online kill off the film writing profession altogether? These are, after all, dark times for the creative arts of all descriptions – the wealthy use Kickstarter and don’t pass on the profits, bands ‘pay to play’, again to get that feted ‘exposure’ – but in the case of film writing, the natural impulse to share ideas, participate and speak one’s mind has to be squared somehow with the urge on the part of others to exploit this.
There are lots of questions here, and if you’ve stuck with me so far hoping I’ll conclude with a neat solution, then my apologies – I don’t have one (and perhaps I should charge cash for it if I did.) I do think there are a few things we should be doing, though. The most obvious one, when it comes to fan writing, is to exercise your own quality control. Look for sites which are literate and honest, not desperately whoring themselves out to get smug retweets from filmmakers or – glory! – quoted on the poster. If a website is unrelentingly positive on absolutely everything they write up, then that should ring alarm bells; either they don’t have the courage to stick by their own opinions (because let’s face it, not every film out there can possibly be the best horror film of 2017, much less in bloody January) or they’re getting ad revenue and haven’t had the honesty to say as much. On the other side of the coin, in a world dominated by the number of ‘likes’ anything from a joke to a life event can muster, we should try not to get involved with deliberate click bait. Controversial opinions are fine and it’s good to be challenged, but click bait articles are often flimsy, pointless guff which make us irritated and stop us seeking out and reading something which might be worthwhile. At least if we discriminate a little, then our reading experience will be better, and who knows? Fan writing might be respected a little more, even allowing those fan writers who would like to make the leap into paid writing to be seen and heard.
Another must, in my book, is to support the upsurge in print media which is currently taking place. Obviously, quality control is still of the utmost importance here, and (as above) not every magazine is a cut above a website, but the indie press at the moment is showing us just how much we’ve missed the physical written word, whilst playing to its strengths by offering what the internet simply can’t do – no Kindle or tablet can ever come close to the pleasures of turning through the pages of a magazine, to my mind. Also, because print editors invest so much time, money and effort in producing such a thing – and I know whereof I speak here – the level of care taken is often clear to see. Whether it’s a cut-and-paste fanzine which harks back to the Eighties or a glossy full-colour project, it’s a world away from online journalism and a resurgence which is worthy of respect.
And as for those who already live by the pen/keyboard – I’m sorry life is so tough for you, but stick to your guns. It must be tempting and often even necessary to capitulate to the unreasonable demands foisted upon you, but this kind of thing is just cumulative and the more you do for less, the less will do for you. Your motto should always be “screw you, pay me”, and if someone offers you £1 for a piece of writing, then your response should simply be, “screw you”.