btw, I don't worry about spelling – that's one reason to hire a writer.

What gets me is he didn't care about the quality as much as the time. Screams content mill to me.

I've got one for you, Lori. First hand, no less.

You know I'm a big knitter. In the past I was a contracted blogger for a knitting company. They compensated us with yarn. Lots and lots of yarn. Not just the yarn and supplies needed to make items to blog about, but $100 worth of yarn (our choice) few months – after submitting something like 6 or 8 posts. That worked for me!

Anyway, last week I saw a listing seeking writers who knit to write pattern descriptions. The pay was low $11/hour, but I thought it might be fun. They only wanted 10 hours per week, so I figured I could write about knitting on evenings or weekends and make $110 a week. Not what I'd LIKE to make, but it would put me back in the knitting world.

Last weekend I heard back. They explained what they wanted and how they worked. They asked if I could re-write (first red flag) a couple of vague pattern descriptions, 75 words each, on the promise that if they used they they would pay. I thought, Why not? He said to let me know how long each one took. Maybe 12 minutes, but I took a moment to research the yarns so I could write something that made sense. He loved them and said he'd pay me. (Of course!) But said most of his writers average SIX MINUTES per entry, so I'd have to get it down to that.

Right then I knew it wasn't for me. Basically, he wants 10 75-word descriptions (or 750 words) per HOUR. For which he'll pay a whopping $11. Really?

I emailed back asking how and where the descriptions would be used. No reply. So I haven't even had the chance to lecture him on how that $11/hour breaks down to $.0146667 per word. I can't even pronounce a number that small – and the 666 seemed fitting.

No, I won't demand payment…I doubt he'd pay me for the half hour I spent on the two blurbs. And I can't even do the math to figure out what the per-word rate would be on those.

Waste. Of. Time.

The more of us getting word out to unsuspecting newbies, the better.

http://www.freelancemarketguides.com/category/bad-jobs/

I saw the first (so-called travel writing) ad yesterday and was going to write a post about it on my blog…but looks like you beat me to it. Great job!