Comments on: Whiny Freelance Writing Fails: A Rant

By: lwidmer

lwidmer — Tue, 02 Jun 2020 14:51:16 +0000

In reply to Paula Hendrickson. Fixed it for you. :) I agree -- WP should make it easier for us to edit responses.

By: Paula Hendrickson

Paula Hendrickson — Tue, 02 Jun 2020 14:37:07 +0000

In reply to lwidmer.

Good for him! I hope he billed her for his time, too.

(Also – I wish I could edit my earlier reply. I must have had some fun typos for “responding” to wind up as “resounding.”)

By: lwidmer

lwidmer — Mon, 01 Jun 2020 13:41:11 +0000

In reply to Paula Hendrickson.

Oh, that’s just horrible form, Paula! He showed his true colors to a lot of people at once, though.

I had something like that happen — not to me, but I was an uncomfortable bystander to it. The client was deserving of the wrath as she had a nasty habit of scheduling conference calls and never showing up for them. I counted a dozen of them before she actually remembered one. I got in the habit of putting the phone on speaker and just working while I waited. After ten minutes, I’d replace the receiver.

On one of the earlier ones she’d missed, she had arranged to talk with her two hired writers — another guy and me. We’d waited close to 20 minutes maybe, and it took one of us emailing her for her to show up. When she got on the line, the other writer, very cordially, berated her for her not respecting his time. He then thanked her and hung up.

It’s what I should have done, too.

By: Paula Hendrickson

Paula Hendrickson — Sat, 30 May 2020 19:17:23 +0000

A few years back, a new writer contributed an article to a magazine I’ve contributed to for much of my career. That publication often sends a pdf of the layout for each section to writers with pieces in those sections. It’s so we can update information or make minor corrections. Instead of responding privately to the editor, this writer hit “reply all” and proceeded to nit-pick probably 50 things in a 350 word piece. None of the changes he suggested had to do with accuracy or fact checking. It was 100% stylistic. He was “correcting” the editors while ignoring the voice of the magazine. He also chose to do it somewhat publicly, so I guess he was trying to prove how smart he is. All he did was come off like an inexperienced wannabe without the brains to keep his own ego in check.

No matter the client, I trust then to know their audience better than I do. And as long as their check clears they can edit the copy however they like.