A Dichotomy Of Journalists
Lindsay Lohan: skilled in self-exploitation.
Journalism’s a funny thing. On the one hand, there’s the part that dictates being right on top of things, with up-to-the-minute news and commentary; the image of the underpaid hack, rushing all over town in search of the latest “scoop”, harassing celebrities (of the minute) and self-proclaimed experts for opinion and sound bites.
Then there’s the other side, the so-called “in-depth” articles, with their old content and attempts at turning over a subject one more time to see if there’s any meat left on the rotting underside; the academics crawling out of the woodwork to spout their views, wear their favourite tweed suit and show off their sky-blue kipper tie that was such a hit in the Seventies.
It’s an odd dichotomy¹ – and one which freelance writers also face.
Imagine you’ve been hired for a blogging job. The client gives you rough guidelines for the niche, the subject area and the kind of content they’re looking for. But they don’t specify precise titles, keywords or anything else². Your first post is due in a couple of days and you need to get organised.
Basically, you have three options open to you:
- Be wildly creative and produce something new and original, which smells of roses, cut grass and freshly-baked bread.
- Be completely unoriginal and regurgitate a putrescent mass of semi-digested content from previous jobs, other sites and Wikipedia.
- Aim for the middle ground and write about something old and wrinkled, but try to glue a new face on it; literary plastic surgery³, a sort of Extreme Makeover for words.
Now, bear in mind that just about everything you can think of has already been written a dozen times and the first option goes out the window. Even if you thought it was original, your idea’s probably been published on six blogs, promoted on Digg, copied, scraped, rewritten in Urdu and Polish, re-credited, printed as a poster, read, thrown away and recycled as toilet paper.
The second option is also not possible: producing some kind of boring, already-seen-this-a-dozen-times gibberish about motivation, business, tips for success or the size of Lindsay Lohan’s… uh… ego (yeah, I had to get a reference in for the pic) is the sort of thing that will get you fired. The client always wants original content.
So you’re stuck with the third option. You’re rewriting stuff that’s been said a million times already.
But maybe not to that client’s audience and maybe not with your particular voice. And that’s the key, right there. Your voice.
Or, to paraphrase those legendary wise women, the members of Bananarama: “It ain’t what you say, it’s the way that you say it.”
¹ You’ll notice the politeness with which I avoided a manifold of other collective nouns that could be used for journalists – and which are far more derogatory and insulting. Benificent mood, what can I say?
² This imaginary job is proper writing, not SEO.
³ Or, as Michael put it, “does-my-bum-look-big-in-this-not-any-more-plasty”.
Aren’t your clients lucky then, that you’re such a talented and thoughtful writer. Otherwise they’d be stuck with a bunch of trite muck.
That’s not really journalism though is it? It’s blogging. Sometimes the two can overlap. Rewriting things in a different way though is nothing special. You have to bring something new. A new voice isn’t enough. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not an elitism thing: Anyone can do it. But throw in a new idea, please, otherwise why is anyone going to read it? I’m not.
I’m still having fun imagining I’ve been hired for a blogging job!
Simone: Well, we try. The alternative is manually scraping – and I’ve never understood the purpose of all those scrape sites anyway!
Rob: Thanks for visiting! You’re right, of course, that journalism and other writing (be it blogging or articles) are different, but I think the thought still applies. “A new voice isn’t enough” is my belief, the same as you – something new, an original angle is needed. But that raises an interesting question itself: given that the Internet is so big, will your original piece be seen as original… or will someone else’s rewrite of your original piece? Especially if they’re higher on a Google search for the keywords…
Paul: There is, apparently, continued business out there for professional bloggers – especially business professionals. One of your countrymen, Chris Champion – who I ‘met’ via a blogging network – actually does that as a career (self-employed). He’s over here: http://www.salientpoint.com.au/
Then there’s me…in my current highly liberated non-professional position as a blog commenter, I don’t have to give a rats about originality, or what anyone thinks (unless it’s complimentary
…I just say what comes out…mostly for my own enjoyment.
But as a person, I’m not in the habit of shooting messengers. I take the message not the council. Perhaps in that regard I might be something of a writer’s dream audience? Having written I know how hard it is just to make something cogent…I tend not to be too critical of style…nor about content per se…if I have any critical inclination, I’d say it’s more toward polemic (for me embodying underlying rationale/s/irrationale/s, connections and intent (which I know is pretty much content or at least associated with it, but I’m kinda hoping you’re catching my drift
).
I don’t have to impress the crap out of someone because they’re paying me and measuring my keywords and how big my ‘market penetration’ is…:-)
When I was writing professionally (Public Service, Web Content Management etc), it was a whole ‘nuther story of course, so I can at least relate.
I reckon that like most forms of communication as we’ve known them, the boundaries are blurring…what was once originality is now ‘copy, paste and slightly edit’. Tongue-in-Cheek is the new Poignancy and relevance is almost irrelevant. Even 120 Characters is the new 140 Characters…our attention-spans are diminishing so rapidly that ‘real-time’ is becoming associated with drying paint.
The gap between appreciation, art, and function is suddenly light-years across…so naturally, we use warp capable communication to bridge the gap.
I’m not the most blogified bloke on the planet by a long shot, but I’ve seen my fair share.
What would I do in the situation you’ve described? Reaction: I’d either ask questions with the intention of clarifying the brief or pick another job.
Considered Response: As content becomes homogenised and pasteurised by dint of it’s own mass and volume, I reckon that engaging a particular audience may come to rely more and more on the ‘social factor’ (or in the new lingo, the ‘SoFa’ ;-P )? Can your particular regurgitation create the associations that I want from my intended audience?
Does the possibility exist where the ‘SoFa’ is king/queen? Where a writer becomes part of the corporate furniture because of the relationships he/she/it has established with a particular audience…writer loyalty is not unheard of?
What if it becomes the central factor in communication once more? Friendship, trust, familiarity? e.g. I can say some pretty bizarre stuff, and if folks know me, they usually get it. I can even say the same stuff over and over in different ways and they either don’t get bored, or don’t tell me ’cause they don’t want to hurt my feelings and know I mean well
. On the other hand, folks that don’t know me may be offended or just bored, or not even that.
I reckon that this very basic principal may be on the comeback? I hope it is. It may also and arguably be an almost mathematical ‘fete accompli’, resulting from the complete and utter saturation of content that the minds of the world are currently drowning in?
In the world of Professional Writers, I reckon this may throw the ball fairly and squarely in the court of the hirer? If they are going to hire a writer, the onus is on them to be clear about their audience, the nature of that audience, the associative responses of that audience and to be able to brief their writers accurately. The days of writer’s reputations rising and falling because of incomplete/inaccurate briefing are hopefully numbered.
Perhaps writers will become the ones that are finally and properly tasked with identify these audience characteristics and delivering to them for the hirer…but I would call that a professional writer and consultant…an extra charge.
And then finally, after all the analysis, there is the simplicity of, is it useful? But that’s as tough to predict as anything else (unless of course you know your audience really well), isn’t it?
Geez! I had no idea I was gunna say all that stuff…see Spike? I reckon what you write is useful…at least to me.
And there is something different about the style of this article…I don’t know if I can put my finger on it. You know when a drummer learns a rhythm and practices it until he doesn’t think about it any more? Then that rhythm begins to break up and the drummer thinks he’s loosin’ it? Then a new rhythm emerges seemingly spontaneously? It’s kinda like that…I like it…it’s still you, but the stones are more rounded by the water in the river.
Anyway, thanks for another great post ol’ Bean
Cheers
Stephen G
Many thanks for that link, Spike! It looks beaut and I plan to make contact today. Best regards, P.