#1. People shouldn’t ask questions if they aren’t prepared for all possible answers
#2. It’s the internet. Fuck it.
#3. 95% of all people who write stuff on message boards are self-righteous and elitist pricks
#4. I made up that statistic because I’m a self-righteous and elitist prick.

If you really do feel bad about it (which I don’t understand why you should), just write a simple apology explaining that it was a joke. You didn’t mean to rile up the collective. Blah blah blah.

I mean, it’s not like you insulted all of the writers by telling them that the writers on “The Wire” are worthless retards because the actors carry the material…

I really don’t think you need to apologize. Fuck `em.

Paul –

Heh, yeah, way to go, WIRE-hater. You’re banned.

Yeah, no, the stuff I said wasn’t a joke, and I don’t think it could be construed as such. I was serious about the stuff I said and felt it to be a serious discussion. But those are good guys, and I also didn’t mean to use their product as the centerpiece of my Mission Statement, either.

I don’t feel bad about my opinion, which is why this is a shitty apology.

– c.

I don’t think you have anything to apologize FOR.

I think a lot of people are stupid and/or Ignorant.
I KNOW a number of people are completely ignorant of what it takes to make it as a working artist of any type.
Take it from a stage actor. You would horrified at how many people think i’m just making it up as i go along. The concept of polishing and honing a piece of material and working on it till i am beyond sick of it, until i reach a point of having the work i’m working on, look like any idiot could do it…Is utterly lost on people outside of the creative life.

So as a result, artists, writer, actors, are downed throughout our culture as not doing “Honest work” And our work is denigrated and not given the respect it is due.

Fuck a whole bunch of that shit. I’ve put up a musical in 3.5 weeks. What i do is GODDAMN WORK.

And in truth Chuck, i too fail to see the point of paying dues. If i work, pay me, or respect me, Preferably both. I’m a big fan of Harlan Ellison, which is one of the reasons i know i could never work in screenwriting. I’d be up on top of a water tower with a sniper rifle, because of some joker in a suit who has money and thinks he can tell my stories better than me. I’d have trouble there i think.

Incoherent rambling aside. Anyone telling you that asking for your due as a creator is RUDE or whatever, is a sure sign of someone who isn’t serious about their own work. And screw them for trying to make anyone less serious about the work.

Fuck the haters. If you’re tired of hating on Wendig, you can come hate on me. I don’t mind at all.

Having been the target for many an internet wank in the past for giving out my opinion (which, heaven fore fend I do that on my own blog, quelle horror!) let me say this:

Fuck ‘em.

Not that I’m saying their douche weasels, that they fuck dead nuns with their mother’s dicks, nothing like that. Someone wanted musings, you offered yours AND INCLUDED that they could take it or leave it, and they – sorry – seriously over reacted. And that is my opinion, for all that’s worth.

People need to learn to fucking scroll.

ANd seriously. Dude. I can show you my battle scars (there is NO fight like the one started by a Mormon Twilighter, let me just tell you, no REALLY) do not back down from offering opinions WHEN ASKED FOR THEM. That was a redonk fight, and they really need to step away from the keyboard.

Jesus, that’s the hill they wanna die on? Getting paid for your work? The hell? Pfft.

And GODDAMMIT, I need an edit button. THEY’RE, not THEIR douche weasels. THEY’RE not douche weasels. bah.

And the other guys commenting are smack on. They need to pull their tampons out, watch some Lifetime TV about their mother letting them sleep with danger, and get the fuck over themselves. I would happily lend a step ladder to enable that activity.

KISSES and SUNSHINE!! <3 <3 <3 Lol.

Dear Mr Chuck.

All of this went *whoosh* right by me. So, as far as I am concerned, nobody was mad at you at all, because I wasn’t. So clearly, you should carry on as normal. And stop whining.

Kindest Regards,
Adventure Cam

Just remember that everybody’s entitled to their opinion, even if they’re wrong.

Also? A good response to “I’m sorry you feel that way” is, to be honest, “I’m not.”

A few observations before I dash to work:
At this stage in my “career”, having written several things and not published them yet, the primary way I would even consider submitting them to an unpaid market is if that market had a kick-ass editor. I need the keenest of eyes and sharpest of wits to give my work a once-over and tell me what I need to do to make it publishable. I would consider that kind of help to be payment.

Second, and related, I don’t need exposure for its own sake: if I suck too much to make a professional sale, what benefit could I possibly derive at this stage from exposure?? Ruin my reputation before I’ve made it?
But let’s say for the sake of argument that I have a good piece, that doesn’t suck, that I just want people to read. If they’re going to offer “exposure” as payment, then they need to argue that they are offering the right sort of exposure: that they’re going to maintain iron-clad high standards that readers, agents, and other editors will recognize and respect, even if it means that some months they can’t publish a full issue or can’t publish at all. If one of those people picks up this magazine, and puts it down saying, “This wasn’t worth $10″ before getting to my story, I don’t benefit. Worse, if they see a “not worth $10″ line on my resume, I suffer.

Now, nobody puts out a magazine intending to suck, and these guys seem to have a solid shot at not sucking, but y’know, shit happens. It’s easy to cut corners and maybe not look too closely, just for the sake of seeing your baby live to one more issue. Which would be understandable, but bad — what I would really need, as a potential contributor, is their assurance that they would rather kill this fucker dead than publish anything below insanely high standards. THAT would be real “for the love”. I’d consider throwing in my lot with some brass-balled bastards like that… … … (but I’d still really like to be paid…)

@Josh: True dat.

@Cam: Dear Adventure Cam, I look forward to your next adventure. Please fight mummies next time, because mummies are total pricks. Thank you. Sincerely, Your Greatest Fan, The Wendigo

@Stoney: You have a way with words. Vile, awesome words. Words so sublime and vile, in fact, you just all locked us on a boatride straight to Hell, into the Devil’s yawning sphincter. Good times. Glad to have you on board.

@Pete: I don’t think anyone’s hating on me. Well, one or two might be, but hey, fuck those guys. I don’t apologize for my opinion, but I am apologizing if my opinion crawled up asses and died.

– c.

Enh. I’m pretty sure that “markets that don’t pay” are on the list of people it’s OK to piss off.

One thing I’ve learned in my years as a crazy person is that people will always have different opinions, whether it’s something minor (Daleks are amazing! “They’re stupid!”) or something really major (Pro-Lifeforce! Pro-ChoicebasedconsequencesinanRPG!)

Just remember that as long as you don’t start dismissing people out of hand for your opinions and as long as you don’t start assaulting people verbally for thinking differently then you are perfectly entitled to your beliefs.

Except for the Dalek thing, of course. He Who Will No Longer Be Named is DEAD to me! Dead I saaaaaaaay!

@John:

The thing is, good editors lurk at paying mags, too. The job of a good editor outside a magazine would be to help you get a story up and running so you could get it published. Publication used to be called a “sale.” “I sold a short story,” was the phrase. Now it’s, what? “I’m giving away a short story!” Which is not the worst thing in the world, it’s not fucking Armageddon or anything, but I think it starts to basically set the bar lower and lower. I give away short fiction here, but I control the exposure, I control the brand.

Further, a mag devoted to high quality all the time will only earn that high quality time and time again by paying the authors. That’s how they assure you they’re devoted to high quality — by paying you and asserting that quality with value.

Exposure is sadly not a measurable value.

Of course, again, my opinions. They may be wildly off-base. What do I know? Maybe I’m shouting at the tides. Maybe I should write just for the love and go back to being miserable at a day job.

– c.

Ah, the debate over FREE rages on! Fun stuff.

Someone in the comments over there noted NEEDLE was more of a collective, but I think once you start accepting unsolicited submissions, you stop being a collective and become a business. And as a business, you have a responsibility to come up with SOME kind of a revenue model, if for no other reason than to ensure your efforts don’t fizzle out a year down the road when your labor of love becomes a beast of burden.

And it most definitely will.

I went through that with my literary journal, Spindle, which didn’t pay contributors and had no real revenue model — we’re doing it for the love, man! — and ultimately collapsed under its own weight when I couldn’t even dedicate my own free time to it. Money talks, good intentions walk, and as one of my favorite posts of yours said: “If you’re going to be exposed, then expose yourself.”

Start your own blog, start a collective, but think hard about giving your stuff away for free to benefit someone else’s gig.

@Guy:

I agree. A collective or a co-op is not “Submit to this magazine that people pay for.” A co-op is, people buy in, and they get something in return. Y’know — no one editor, it’s a group of peer review rather than submission, people who “pay in” get some revenue or percentage back, everybody gets a say as a blog post or an article, etc.etc. — A farm co-op has me pay money to get regular produce.

Do Some Damage is a collective or maybe a co-op. Jet Pack was a collective. Group of people get together and basically rock a blog together, maybe around articles, maybe around fiction, whatever. And I support that. You control the exposure; you control the brand. You get as much out of it as anybody. Nothing to do with money. Money starts to dirty the equation; it makes a “for the love” venture into a business.

My advice to any writer is to really think long and hard about giving fiction away for free. It may be valuable to them, yes. Obviously some writers have succeeded this way. Most don’t, I suspect. Because mostly, the quality of “free fiction” is crap.

But that’s the side I fall on. Others come to the other side. I don’t really get it, but I don’t have to. They don’t rely on me to agree with the model, and I hope nobody takes these disagreements personally. I mean, I’m pretty sure they *have* — which is a shame.

– c.

As someone else who has a bad habit of fighting on the Internet, I empathize. However, I’ve made a commitment to myself that I will focus on positive interactions, and downsize negative ones. If they want to try a different business model, that’s cool. If they want to take criticisms personally and label you an asshole, that’s cool too — now you know not to work with those people.

But money always needs to flow to the writer. Always always ALWAYS.

Guy said: “Start your own blog, start a collective, but think hard about giving your stuff away for free to benefit someone else’s gig.”

This. This x 100.

Gonna have to ruminate over the whole pay, don’t pay thing, but I have a correction. Steve Weddle and John Hornor Jacobs are the visionaries and heavy lifters behind Needle. All I did was proofread some shit. Probably badly.

@Eddy:

Always a voice of sanity, you lovable Webbslinger.

– c.

Fair, nuff, Big @Dan.

And I’m sure you proofread like a champ. Like a queen. Like a resplendent, glorious queen, luminescent and lambent.

… too far? I’m just saying, you’re a beautiful man.

– c.

That there was a hubbub at all has me befuddled.

@Buzz:

Word. I feel like either the one crazy nut in a room full of sane dudes in suits, or the one sane man in an asylum. Either way, I just wasn’t communicating properly.

– c.

Nothing interesting to add, save that I agree with your original statement, and Guy’s comment, especially. I have thoughts about literary communes with no revenue models, but they won’t enlighten the discourse here or anywhere else, so I’ll keep em to m’self. Cheers.

I missed this as it was going down, but having just perused the various posts at the various places. The image now firmly planted in my head is of a hilltop littered with angry Straw Men.

“AAAGH! You said we have to pay writers a million dollars!”
“GRRR! You said no-one can do ANYTHING without a bag of cash!”
“ROWR! You hate free things!”

Funny how a simple statement claiming that writers should get paid for their work can incite such Net-rage.

But then again, this is the Inter-web. Rational discourse gets lost quicker than a midget at a KISS concert. All I have to say is that if people want to build straw men on a hill in an attempt to sound cool, let them. I’ll just consider myself to be a modern day Druid bearing the flickering torch of “keep your trap shut while the adults are talking.”

***Opinions expressed in this post are not necessarily shared by Chuck or anyone else that is a part of this community….I do have some spare torches around here somewhere, though.

@Chuck: Is it okay if I drop this mic here?

@Chuck:
The editing thing is important to me. I have a lot of respect for the editors at the magazines I’ve submitted to (I would not otherwise submit there), but I’ve never gotten any real feedback from them, just some (very politely worded) “no thanks” letters.
If a non-paying market promised a real read-through and honest feedback in lieu of payment, I would have to consider that, as an investment. After all, I’ve devoted a lot of time to reading other peoples’ stuff in online workshops, and am seriously considering spending north of a grand on a professional workshop this fall. By comparison, trading a short story for assistance sounds like a deal. … But then, that’s kind of assuming from the start that what I’m shopping around is a half-polished turd, isn’t it?

Exposure is definitely not a measurably quantity. It’s not even that easy to define. Maybe I should describe what it means to me: There’s really only one magazine I’ve considered submitting to purely because of exposure, and that’s The Strand (and they pay, though less-than-professional rates). Those are the people who published Christie, Conan Doyle, Sayers, etc. When I see someone listing that market on their resume, I tend to think, “That person is kind of a badass”. And when I say ‘exposure’ I think I really mean ‘reputation’: I want to be able to list The Strand as a publishing credit, because … well, ultimately because I’m vain and I like to think of myself as being in their league.

It’s tough to remember sometimes that nobody’s selecting manuscripts at random and saying, “Hey, it’s your turn to be a Published Author. Here’s your laurel wreath.” There aren’t really any odds to increase, and no amount of street cred will convince a publisher that shit is gold. Modulo the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, good writing will eventually be published by good markets, and bad writing won’t.

Started replying on the whole pay the writer thing, then I realized I was writng a whole freaking blog post. So I did that instead. http://tinyurl.com/y8pkz7w

I’m late to this shindig, and I haven’t gone through the tweets and whatnot; just read the initial Needle guidelines and the comments posted there. What you said seemed reasonable; most of the comments I read there seemed (relatively) reasonable, as well. I’ve come to know Steve Weddle a little from posting on each other’s blogs and reading each other’s flash stories (his are better), and I suspect he’d like nothing better than to be able to pay, but he doesn’t see a way to make it work, and, as noted above, wants it to work more as a writer’s cooperative, and not have to become a businessman, which would take away from his writing time. This is wise. There are plenty of businessmen; writers as talented and supportive of others as Steve are in short supply.

The thread brought me to only one solid conclusion, though it may seem intemperate to some:

Lein Shory is a douch nozzle.

Why he jumped all over your initial comment like a winged otter with a gonorrhea-infested winged phallus is completely beyond imagination. It’s not like he doesn’t understand getting paid; his blog has a prominent link where you can click to “Donate
Because you’ve paid for entertainment far worse than this. ”

Vigorous debate is good and should be encouraged, but going off on someone like that is prima facie proof of asshattery. Not the way to win friends and influence people.

Steve’s a great guy, and reading his stories, a true talent.

I’d argue that there are always ways to make “pay the writer” work. The Internet makes this easier, not harder. If small RPG game companies (an industry a lot “deader” than fiction) can pay its writers, so can fiction outlets. As I said, Kickstarter, profit sharing, higher costs, out-of-pocket, something, anything. One can say, “But there’s no way to pay the writers!” but that doesn’t make it true. The mag isn’t a co-op. They charge to sell it, and further, they’re not open to unsolicited submissions, as @Guy notes. That doesn’t make them bad people, it doesn’t make it a bad magazine, but it means it’s a model of doing things I think inadvertently exploits the writers.

The money that comes serves (presumably) the production of the journal and the upkeep of the site.

But, the one thing above all else that any journal needs is the writers. Without that, it’s just an empty book.

Hence, “writers” and the work they provide are part of that production, part of that upkeep. Not just part of it, but the most critical component. So, they get paid first.

That’s how it always was. But more and more we cede territory to the notion of giving fiction away and treating it like trash. It’s not trash. It’s valuable.

Lein’s initial comment wasn’t particularly enlightening, but his second comment was calmer, and response-worthy. It’s the Internet; some degree of asshattery is sadly expected, anymore.

– c.

Chuck…you come out with stink like that. Poop. You poopmouth, with poop out of your mouth.

How dare you. I, for one, hope I never get paid as a writer and that all the blood, sweat and tears that I pour into my work will never be recognized as anything more than a minor hobby or grotesque display of egotistical undiscovered talent. I don’t even know if that made sense, but I don’t care.

You stay classy, Terribleminds. I’m Gina Maxwell?

Speaking of places that pull this off, are you familiar with Strange Horizons? Web-only. They live on donations, grants, and volunteers, but manage to pay professional rates. (I’m not claiming that this will work for anyone else, and it may entail untold hardship and misery, but it can be done)

John:

I do like Strange Horizons quite a bit. Quality fiction in there. Which is part of the whole equation, by the way — paying markets are the only ones I prefer to support, both because they pay the writers *and* that usually translates to quality work.

– c.

Also: convo has hopped over to Danny Boy’s site, and you’ll find more blathering nonsense from me over yonder –

http://danielboshea.wordpress.com/2010/04/13/writers-and-paydays-and-marketing-and-shit-like-that/

Dana,

Since you were late to this shindig, you might have missed this tweet by Chuck:

“I dunno where the revenue comes from. Elves. Advertising. Unicorn shit. I don’t care. I’m not a businessman. I’m a writer.”

After following that exchange for the better part of the day, I decided to put in my two cents. If it had been a productive conversation, with real ideas exchanged, I would never have gotten mouthy. But I know Steve & Co. are just trying to do something cool and doing their best to do right by everyone.

I don’t doubt that Chuck’s heart is in the right place. I think I agree with his general sentiment. I just didn’t agree with what looked to me like belligerence. I think if you make a statement such as “pay the writers,” then when asked for ideas your response shouldn’t be, “I don’t know. Unicorn shit. You figure it out.” His responses after that were “calmer, and response-worthy,” as he said about mine.

Should I have kept my mouth shut? Probably. But a lot of us could be a little more diplomatic on the Internet–while still being passionate about what we believe in.

Lein Shory
“Douch Nozzle”

Additional thoughts here:
http://shoryland.com/2010/04/bumperstickerisms.html

Lein —

I dunno, whatever, man. I actually try to half-ass defend you to be nice, and you lower the discourse by basically writing a whole blog post about me. What do you want me to say? Yay? Gosh, that guy’s awesome? You take my one tweet out of context (out of the approximately 70 billion words I’ve committed to the subject), and suddenly I’m an asshat? Did I piss in your eyes or something?

I don’t even know you. I know Steve at least peripherally, and felt comfortable tweeting what I thought was a joke. “Unicorn shit” is not usually a moniker of Internet rage. Hell, I still think it’s funny. Because you never see a unicorn shit, do you?

No, you don’t.

This conversation has been very productive. But some people throw up barriers to that conversation. I’m trying to have a discussion. Not a pissing contest. So, if that’s your aim, please go elsewhere — the Internet is full of people willing to engage in said cock-waving matches.

– c.

Word to the wise: If Awesomeface Beardhead pisses in your eye YOU THANK HIM FOR THE PRIVILEGE AND ASK HIM PLEASE SIR, MAY I HAVE SOME MORE?

On a more serious note, I firmly believe that writers should be paid for their work. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for a labour — and having been through three of those bitches, yeah. Writing’s as painful (but in a different way) as childbirth — to have some sort of tangible recompense for the trouble. Shit, I popped out three kids; they didn’t then put the children in a glass case and tell me that, for all the bother I went through y’know, growing and bleeding and ripping myself to shreds birthing them, I’d get to look at them beside all the other beautiful babies in the hospital.

I can see the argument that a small publication just getting off the ground probably wouldn’t have the cash to pay their writers monetarily. But that’s why other models offer complimentary copies if it’s a print mag. It might not be money, but it’s LIKE money in that they don’t have to pay for x number of copies to send to their friends and family. Free doesn’t pay the bills, true, but freeing some cash from their pockets helps mitigate the burden somewhat. And that’s really all a job is, isn’t it? A way to mitigate the financial burden of eating, having a house and maybe some internets on which to argue.

But what the hell do I know? I’m not a Big Name Author, and I’ve had dick for publishing credits, unless you count a non-paying webzine years and years ago. But even though I submitted to them knowing I wouldn’t get paid, they didn’t tell me that my payment was to feel privileged that my work was alongside possible BNAs.

Rage concluded. Feel free to shit on me too; I have three kids. I’ve developed heavy resistance to fecal matter, verbal or actual.

You know, I don’t know how to fucking comment on this horse piss without coming off like the lead fanboi of the Wendigclub. (C-H-U See you real soon. C-uh-K Why? Cause I said so, motherfucker. W-E-N-D-I-G). I’ve have spent the last two hours of my life on a day that I really could have used something positive to enter my world view, listening to some of the most overblown reactions I’ve had the misfortune of reading on the internet… and I read the World of Warcraft forums daily! Somehow, this entire topic has surpassed twelve-year old rage demanding Blizzard give them an I WIN button and a pony.

“I don’t doubt that Chuck’s heart is in the right place. I think I agree with his general sentiment. I just didn’t agree with what looked to me like belligerence”

I’ve read the post and comments over at Needle, Mr. Shory. You were the only one that got belligerent. And you’re still doing it. But this makes me wonder… maybe, just maybe I can increase my blog traffic and the amount of people saying my name by blowing what you’ve said out of proportion also – raise the ante anew – and then, BINGO!

I too could win the Internet! FUCK YEAH!

I was going to do some serial fictions on my blog. I went through a lot of preperation for a horror story, down to the point of writing the first couple of installments. My wife eventually wanted to know what in the hell was taking up so much of my time, and I told her. I gave her the entire run-down on what I wanted to do, and she actually slapped me (not hard, but not on the ass either. I like the dirty thing she… you know what, I am getting off subject). She told me I could do it if I put up a donation button. I thought about that for a while, and realized, I don’t want that on my blog, I don’t want to feel like I am begging for money. But I also realized that all the hours I put into would be worth drumming up some people to read my stuff; I still think that is worthwhile. However, I don’t want to commit to a 90,000 word serial to do that – flash fiction is more the answer for me.

And as soon as my kids give me some peace, I’ll even do that.

So the short of it is this: get fucking paid, and demand that you get paid. And stop being a douche online. And offline. Just stop being a douche. Anonymity on the internet may be the worst thing to happen to social discourse since mouth-herpes.

Chuck,

I’m sorry about the level of vitriol that has come your way for simply offering your opinion. I think you have good points and great suggestions.

It’s going to take time to figure out our course with NEEDLE, as I’ve stated elsewhere, and I don’t want you to think we bear you any ill-will or have taken umbrage at your words. I don’t know if we’ll be able to offer payment this summer (even though we’ve already got some amazing larger name talent on-board) but I’m going to do my best to pursue as much value-added material for the contributors as humanly possible, even if it’s creating individual banners for their stories, or larger ads for their forthcoming work. And I know that Steve will be opening up a discussion, very soon, on ways to make this endeavor sustainable while compensating the writers.

So, thank you, Chuck, for stirring the pot, you old pot-stirrer, you.

And Steve has opened that discussion at http://needlemag.wordpress.com/2010/04/13/pay-the-writer-ehow/

If you read only the comments on the Needle site and didn’t read the whole series of tweets, don’t call somebody a name in the comments here. That’s what douche nozzles do.

@John:

It’s okay. I am assured that this level of vitriol means “I’ve made it.”

Hey, saw that post over at NEEDLE, and it’s pretty awesome. It’s very relieving to see, because it feels like a good discussion, and I’m very, very happy to see that you guys are nice enough to give an arena for that idea to fight itself and see what works. In the meantime, pushing for value-added perks is a good way to go, and also a nice touch.

So, well done, and thanks. I keep going to that SHORYLAND blog and whispering “Chupacabra,” but they don’t stop, which means they must not be your thugs. Over there, I’m a douche, and I’m pissing in people’s cornflakes, and I think I gave birth to Hitler, and I killed Jesus by smothering him under a pile of unicorn shit. It’s rough stuff.

Dangit.

– c.

@Rick:

You crack my shit up.

Thankfully, you do not shit my crack up.

– c.

They chopped off Thomas More’s head. You’ve stuck by your guns, and done so with remarkable aplomb, even though people have been attacking you. I don’t care who you are, but you have to respect someone who sticks to their convictions. Even if their head gets chopped off.

You’ll recall, I’m a writer, too. One of the reasons I stayed so silent in the kerfuffle is that I agree with you. I just don’t have any idea how we’re gonna make it work – and it might not happen over night. I’m gonna let the big throbbing brains behind the curtain deal with that and focus my energies on making the next issue look fantastic, a publication that the writers will feel proud to display. That’s the least I can do. That said, I’m just the art guy and I’m putting in a lot of time on this magazine when I should be working on marketing materials for the novel that Stacia is shopping. So, if I greeted what you had to say about “writers need to get paid” with some foot-dragging, it’s only because it means more work for me, rather than a disagreement with what you were saying.

After all, Shakespeare got to get paid, son.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5DpkNX2GxRw

Shakespeare do got to get paid. http://www.thisnext.com/show/item-images/D5155FEA/

Did I write “done so”? Oy vey. Thank Chthulu for editors.

If I ever do shit your crack up, I assume after all is done we’ll agree to never speak of it, ever again.

(Talking about it like it didn’t happen doesn’t count right? I don’t want this too invalidateay ouray agreementay.)

By the way, you’re all lovely people.

And @Rick — is that line (“‘Cause I said so, motherfucker!”) from Charles Fleischer?

– c.

Not paying writers is a step down the slippery slope towards COMMUNISM.

… What? It is!

More seriously, I don’t see how you could have been so level-headed with people exploding at you. I would have said pretty much exactly what I just said above because as soon as someone starts flinging poo, I jump right into that shit and fling back. I never really grew out of being a /b/tard I guess.

That said, what with you being so calm and mature (at least in the posts I read, I didn’t read all of it — brain hurts trying to think of why someone would be against paying people for work they’re doing) I don’t really see why you’re being demonised like you are. Did they delete the post everyone is reacting to, where you lost your shit and told everyone to fuck off and die, or something?

I have anger issues, so it’s actually hard for me to uhh, not be a screaming ass on the Internet.

I just figure, it’s best to tamp that down and try to be semi-almost-maybe-rational, because that’s the only way the conversation is going to continue. Otherwise, it devolves into a pissing match. And a pissing match isn’t a conversation.

The haters, I fling a little poo, maybe, but for the most part, they’re like bugs. Try to ignore them, hope they fly away and find a shitpile somewhere. And that may be what they hope about me, ironically enough.

– c.

Dunno – some bit from a comedian that stuck in my head from forever ago. And be warned – the Eternal Wife is very put out with Awesomeface. She may show her wroth, whatever that means.

Timely post. I’m struggling with this right now. I just launched a literary journal for teens, by teens. And I went with the non-paying lit rag model. But…I’m torn. I really would like to give contributors a token payment. I think I’ll get more submissions if I offer a token payment. I’ve been reading up on both sides of this argument. I know what it’s like to not get paid for my work. UGH. And now I’m doing that to those who submit to Liminal. But…part of me also really jives with the paying dues side. Man. This is a tuffy. Anyway, your post here may have tipped me over onto the paying side of the see saw.

So thanks for that.

@Rick — Yay! That comedian may very well have been Charles Fleischer, the voice of Roger Rabbit.

@Amy — Well, you are dealing with teens. That said, it wouldn’t be the worst idea to get into their heads that writing deserves non-ephemeral recompense.

– c.

Money should flow towards the writer. I didn’t think this was a new concept.

You did a good work out there Chuck. Those guys at NEEDLE did give your idea a though and, even if they don’t do it in the end, your planted the seed for next time. And that good if you ask me.

But that whole story made me think of the “for the love of” thing. You know, they say artists are supposed to do their stuff out of pure passion. Maybe. But if they only did it out of passion and not wanting any reward for their hard work, then they would be poor. They would all be dead in a dark alley that smells of piss.

But now when people do art for money, you get what I call the “Metallica effect”. Why Metallica? Here’s a little story. Long ago, before then end of the ’80s there was a metal band called Metallica. They started small but grew. By the second half of the ’80s they did a video for one of their song called One. Many fans grew angry, saying the band sold themselves. And it continued as the band released a new album with a ballad. But the fan grew. By 1993 (or around that), the band released a new album which sounded different and then fans went mad. People said the band stopped doing music for pleasure and went for money. And this hasn’t stop yet.

The problem is, how do you know they don’t do it for the love of it? And what I saw in some comments was just that: “You want money for your art, then you do art for money and not out of passion.” But what about the idea of “Out of passion, I want to live thanks to my art.” It seems in this world passion and money can’t go together… let sport-people aside.

So I’m with you Chuck. A writer should always get something for their work. As musicians do. And painters. And sculptors. And translators. And chemists. And everyone else.

Shit, THATS where i left my white power.

Ummm, can i have it back please?

(you can keep the cat, beardy)

@Jay:

…white power?

– c.

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