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Topic: When a mag steals a freelancer's pitch....
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| h2 | Posted – 12/4/2008 2:51:40 PM | show profile | email poster I'm an established freelancer and have pitched a few publications where my story ideas were rejected, only to have the same article (no, not a similar one) show up later by a staff writer. In the case of New York magazine, it was a few weeks after my email and follow-up calls. In the case of SmartMoney, it was several months later. Other than not pitching the pub again, what's the best way to deal with this? An email to the editor, noting the coincidence and our similar tastes in stories? I don't want to appear to have sour grapes (although I think I am entitled to a case or two). I know this is a widespread problem, and it would be great if pubs that did this were exposed. Anyone care to mention mags with similar modes of operation? Thanks, |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 12/4/2008 3:52:50 PM | show profile You can post your experience here, but it probably won't have any effect. For one thing, many people will doubt whether your idea was actually stolen |
| WordyBird | Posted – 12/4/2008 4:41:56 PM | show profile This has come up many times. Standard responses will be: 1. The magazine may have already planned something similar to your idea. 2. Your idea may have been pitched by a dozen different people. 3. They may have liked the idea but there was a typo in your query letter so they didn't think you'd be the best writer for it. 4. Tough noogs. You don't own the idea. No one saw you think up the idea. You can't prove anything. Just saying. That's how folks are going to respond. |
| Wolf Shadow | Posted – 12/4/2008 7:34:45 PM | show profile I am going to sound like a nut, but my livelihood does not or will not depend on magazines or newspapers (nonetheless, I would like to break in to that medium as well). So for me, pitching to a magazine would be/and is for fun..and I don't want to have the idea taken from me either. SO -- I plan to pitch the idea; if I think it is really unique/interesting, I will write it at the same time and it is rejected, a few weeks later it will go up in a blog. Some of the pubs that I have looked at only write a paragraph or 2 in regards to a particular topic -- I could write that and more in a blog entry. It may look as it appears ahead of the wave of publications. I could see sending a follow-up pitch with a link to the entry and saying, "this is what I did with idea X" and for the new pitch, "now here is idea Y" Don't know if you could do that, too, h2, or especially for those pubs that seem to be using your ideas. |
| abqwriter | Posted – 12/4/2008 8:27:09 PM | show profile Check the lead time of the magazine. Most are several months out from publication. If your query was far enough out to have been received before the story would have been discussed, accepted and assigned as a viable project, you can always send an email to the editor stating your suspicions. Yes, it will burn a bridge, but it is one of your options. I burned a bridge once and proved an editor did indeed steal an idea, because I save all of my emails and pulled one up from two years prior where he wrote me and said that if he covered that specific topic, he'd use me. He didn't, and I pitched a fit. I won, got paid a kill fee, and burned a bridge that probably lost me several thousand dollars in revenue over the course of the year. So decide if it's worth it. If it is, press forward with your complaint. If not, see the list above as to what else might have happened. |
| TheSecondShift | Posted – 12/4/2008 10:34:40 PM | show profile It happens. I've even had them use the exact same hed that I submitted in my query. That same ed told me that yes, she'd used "some" of my idea and then admitted that the didn't use many freelancers anyway after stringing me along for months. I'm confident that karma will rear its ugly head. In the meantime and in between time, when I have to follow up on an idea that's taking a while, I will say I'd like to send elsewhere if they aren't interested. Might not work, but it makes me feel better that they might think twice about duplicating my work and keeps me from getting upset anymore. |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 12/5/2008 2:52:32 AM | show profile The trouble with that is a two-paragraph blog entry, as a sample, won't help you sell a feature piece. And no editor is going to look at your blog and figure out whether you "scooped" anyone, and in all likelihood, no matter how original it is, there is probably a comparable article on the topic that preceded you. --SO -- I plan to pitch the idea; if I think it is really unique/interesting, I will write it at the same time and it is rejected, a few weeks later it will go up in a blog. Some of the pubs that I have looked at only write a paragraph or 2 in regards to a particular topic -- I could write that and more in a blog entry. It may look as it appears ahead of the wave of publications. I could see sending a follow-up pitch with a link to the entry and saying, "this is what I did with idea X" and for the new pitch, "now here is idea Y" Don't know if you could do that, too, h2, or especially for those pubs that seem to be using your ideas. --- |
| WordyBird | Posted – 12/5/2008 11:31:21 AM | show profile "I burned a bridge once and proved an editor did indeed steal an idea, because I save all of my emails and pulled one up from two years prior where he wrote me and said that if he covered that specific topic, he'd use me. He didn't, and I pitched a fit. I won, got paid a kill fee, and burned a bridge that probably lost me several thousand dollars in revenue over the course of the year." Wow, ABQ. Two years? The guy may have just forgotten and when someone else pitched that idea, used that person. I'm guessing you didn't think it was worth it? |
| candylilacs | Posted – 12/5/2008 1:03:21 PM | show profile I only brought it up once. I pitched an idea to a major daily's editor three months earlier. She ignored it. I followed up twice in the next month, still no answer. Three weeks later the story shows up EXACTLY on my topic, but much, much lamer than I would have written and poorly researched. Turns out the freelancer was a friend of hers and she wrote (and I quote): "Oh, you didn't get my rejection? I thought I sent you something saying that we were going to go with XXX because she queried about a long time ago. It was so similar to yours we couldn't use your idea." Amazing, she couldn't be bothered to actually respond to my pitches, but when I hinted at the date of my pitches and the subsequent story, she got back to me within hours. I know and she knows. But that's about all you'll get out of it. c. ------ Dealing with being laid off, so you don't have to! www.laidoffjournal.com |
| chucho | Posted – 12/5/2008 3:07:01 PM | show profile Editors can be schmucks by taking your idea and passing it on to somebody else? Who knew! That said: Ideas cannot be stolen because they don't belong to anyone. It's called the "marketplace of ideas" and it's a concept that they teach in Mass Comm Law classes. The idea behind the freedom of people to use other people's ideas is that if you prescribe proprietary status to ideas, nobody could implement an idea without checking to see who "owns" it. This is not something freelancers would want, because -- after all -- where do freelancers get their ideas? Hmmmmmmm? Be honest. PS: I find that freelancers tend to want commitment from editors before actually doing any work for the story. But if freelancers choose to do it this way, then they risk having their ideas "stolen" because to sell a story you haven't written, all you have is the idea, which doesn't belong to you -- it belongs to everyone. You words, on the other hand, are another matter. |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 12/5/2008 4:47:40 PM | show profile This is lawyer thinking. One part of the magazine industry is that writers send pitchers to editors trying to get them to commission the article. Yes, the editor can legally steal the idea, but that doesn't make it right. And only a schmuck would defend this as OK --Editors can be schmucks by taking your idea and passing it on to somebody else? Who knew! That said: Ideas cannot be stolen because they don't belong to anyone. It's called the "marketplace of ideas" and it's a concept that they teach in Mass Comm Law classes. The idea behind the freedom of people to use other people's ideas is that if you prescribe proprietary status to ideas, nobody could implement an idea without checking to see who "owns" it. This is not something freelancers would want, because -- after all -- where do freelancers get their ideas? Hmmmmmmm? Be honest. PS: I find that freelancers tend to want commitment from editors before actually doing any work for the story. But if freelancers choose to do it this way, then they risk having their ideas "stolen" because to sell a story you haven't written, all you have is the idea, which doesn't belong to you -- it belongs to everyone. You words, on the other hand, are another matter.-- |
| abqwriter | Posted – 12/5/2008 7:46:19 PM | show profile Wordybird - nope - he didn't forget, and he said as much. He said he thought I'd released him from the promise. When I produced the email, he paid the kill fee. I, on the other hand, should have been more graceful and not pushed the issue. It burned a good working relationship by nailing him to the wall. I learned a lot from that. |
| chucho | Posted – 12/6/2008 8:05:55 AM | show profile Dribble, I'm not defending the practice. But it has to be said that there are a lot of people with great ideas and poor execution, or execution that somehow just has an off-putting effect with editors. What is an editor supposed to do? If somebody comes with a good idea but shows poor execution, or isn't up to the standards expected in X publication (or maybe simply didn't submit the pitch in accordance to rules they might have on the website, or maybe the idea was poorly expressed or not exactly what they're looking for) by your logic the editor must either a.) accept the freelancer that came up with the idea, or b.) place said idea on some kind of list of article topics that cannot be farmed out lest the freelancer with the idea gets angry and complains about idea stealing? Also: where do freelancers get their ideas anyway? I've been around long enough to see that freelancers farm their own ideas from reviewing articles already in circulation. I know freelancers that are very possessive and secretive about what they're doing because they know others are out there competing in the marketplace. This is, after all, little more than a product you're producing in a marketplace of ideas in a country with freedom of expression -- with very specific laws regarding intellectual property. What some people don't seem to realize is that the Law of Mass Communications in this country defends the marketplace of ideas -- that nobody has intellectual ownership of these ideas. It helps freelancers as much as hurts them. You see an article in the Bloom County Beacon and you say to yourself "gee, that's a great topic -- I bet I can do my own version of this idea for publication in another market." So you pitch that idea to another market. If ideas were proprietary, you couldn't do that. What's the solution? Don't cold-call publications and give them your ideas. Develop relationships with editors. Have sold and compelling clips so editors don't say to themselves: "Gee that's a great idea, but I'm not extremely impressed by the portfolio. I should mentally bookmark this idea and give it to someone else, a with whom I've worked with and trust and who is low maintenance, somebody I know who meets deadline, doesn't make mistakes and/or isn't a drama queen. Should I take a chance on this stranger, or shoudl I go with somebody I know and with whom I have a professional working relationship." I know this rankles fur, but that's the nature of the marketplace. So what do you do? Don't give ideas in unfamiliar territory. Provide your resume and clips and say: "Please keep me in mind" or something like that. You could even have a first draft of an article. (Freelancer hate to do that, I know.) Fish for interest before giving out your "unique" ideas. (I put that in quotes, because few ideas are unique, and freelancers are always looking at published work to develop their own stories.) If editors are impressed by your clips and respond positively to them, then you can start to develop mutual trust and understanding. One time I pitched an idea to the NYC City section. Many years ago. It was about the annual busking competition (where musicians compete to get prime spaces in the city's subway system). I checked the NYT archive, and because it was a relatively new program, the paper had not published this story. The editor was kind enough to reply, saying "this sound like something we would have written about in the past." It was not something they had written about in the past. A week after the competition (I had pitched it two months before the competition), sure enough, there it was in the NYT. Was this my idea? Sure, I hit it first. Was this a unique idea? Of course not. Few ideas are. Of course the NYT would cover this event. They just didn't want to farm it out. Simple as that. Too many times, freelancers blitz email in-boxes to editors they don't know and have never met (and often with little understanding of the specific publication's requirements and preferred styles and themes) with story ideas. Then they become irate if later they see that idea manifest in these publications. Big surprise! So, actually, editors can be schmucks (editors that harvest ideas from freelancers, then give the assignments to friends or preferred writers) and freelancers can be schmucks (unaware of their own limitations, or unaware of the kinds of articles or submission requirements of these publications, who later become angry and frustrated when they can get work but see their ideas in print). And to answer the OP's questions: if you feel like an injustice has been done to you I would not email the editor your feelings. If you feel strongly about this, have the guts to call them and speak to them in person. Don't be accusatory, have a discussion and begin developing a relationship here. Or move on and lean from this experience how to cold-pitch (tossing story ideas to unknown editors). |
| intraining | Posted – 12/6/2008 3:16:45 PM | show profile chucho, the idea that freelancers shouldn't sent cold pitches to editors they don't know is completely asinine and counterproductive. How else is one supposed to break onto a new market?! Building a relationship can take as long as it does to land an assignment with a query. Your advice is ludicrous and you're obviously speaking from an editor's. POV. Freelancers just need to realize that they're taking a risk when pitching and make peace with that. Otherwise they'll never be successful. You miss 100% of the shots you don't take. I like the idea of letting the ed know you will pitch elsewhere if the don't move on it/respond. That way they know they're not the only pub you're interested in and can't get mad if they steal your idea and find the story in another pub. |
| onmyown | Posted – 12/6/2008 3:26:37 PM | show profile Bravo, Chucho Chucho, you hit the nail on the head. This issue continues to surprise me. Do you really think many freelancers can pitch ideas on a topic that an editor--who covers said topic on a daily basis--would never have heard of if not for some random freelancer? Hardly. I'd like to know how many times the OP pitched SmartMoney. How often does s/he read the magazine? You have to know a magazine really well to successfully pitch. And again, where did the OP get these oh-so-original ideas? From another publication? I'm so tired of this issue and these indignant freelancers. It is just so not an issue--and certainly not a "widespread problem" as the OP says. Please remember what I said several months ago here--freelancers are like telemarketers. You are trying to sell something--an idea, yes, but also yourself. Simply sending in an "idea" is not enough to get you a job. |
| DQ102 | Posted – 12/6/2008 5:03:45 PM | show profile I can relate, h2. I pitched a story to a magazine I hadn't written for before. The editor loved it so much he asked me to call him. We chatted, and he assigned me the story via phone and through a follow-up email. I was told I didn't need to start on it right away as the issue it was to run in was a few months out. Then another editor at the magazine was put in charge of working with me. I contacted him a few times for the due date, then he told me that the section I had pitched the story for wasn't running, so he didn't need me to write it. Months later I happened to spot the story I pitched. It ran in the issue I was originally told it would run in, and it was written by an in-house writer. He even used the examples I pitched in my story and quoted the people I had said I was going to interview. I may be naive, but I think my idea somehow got put into a master ideas file and was accidentally poached. Still, it infuriated me. I wound up pitching the article to another publication and getting it published. But I wasn't the first one to break the story, which I had originally discovered and pitched! Anyway, I never complained to the magazine that stole my story because I was afraid they would blacklist me. I still smart over it, but I have gotten a few assignments from this magazine, and I really do think it wasn't "stolen" purposely. |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 12/6/2008 9:26:32 PM | show profile Churcho, it's pretty hard for most writers to establish a relationship with an editor they don't know without submitting ideas, especially at consumer and higher-level magazines. I've gotten assignments by submitting clips, but only after I had years and years of experience, awards, etc. |
| mumbo jumbo | Posted – 12/7/2008 1:38:55 AM | show profile I have a staff of 6 writers, and use some freelance. Inevitably the same ideas will come through queries and from my staffers. Of course the staff writers get first dibs. Doesn't matter if the freelancer pitched it the day before my writers did at our story idea meeting. It's their job to develop story ideas. I would much rather assign my own ideas to writers, rather than be pitched, unless I ask for queries. |
| interjections | Posted – 12/7/2008 2:21:37 PM | show profile | email poster Wow, there's nothing like a reality check! I have been writing all my life, but have not pursued it professionally. Recently, I decided I would make a go of it, basically because I am stuck in a crap job. I went through some articles, essays and stories I wrote. I found two great articles that I'd like to submit to publications I read all the time, so what do I find this morning? This thread, lol. It basically sounds like I can forget it. But, I will just send the query letter and the article and see what happens. If they "steal" it, then so be it. It's only sitting in the dusty basement of My Documents anyway. I do have some questions. How does chucho suggest someone like me develop a relationship with an editor? I have no clips to send. Just an article that I think is really solid and I'm my own toughest critic. I take offense to the notion that freelancers are just taking ideas from other publications. I understand that's what most may do, but certainly not all. I also understand and I am grateful that ideas do not live in a vacuum. I know with my article that I am not the only one to have experienced what I am writing about. In fact, the success of my article will depend on people experiencing something very similar (it's about relationships). It sucks, but it sounds like it is way too easy for Editors to just pass along your idea to someone they know, like and trust. This makes it seem like submissions are strictly for getting ideas, and if they happen upon a brilliant writer (unlikely) they might give them a shot, if compelled. Thanks, this is a great thread with a wealth of information. |
| chucho | Posted – 12/7/2008 3:19:20 PM | show profile >> I do have some questions. How does chucho suggest someone like me develop a relationship with an editor? I have no clips to send. Just an article that I think is really solid and I'm my own toughest critic. The best I can suggest is good old-fashioned networking. That clip might be good, but if it's old it's not worth as much. A lot of editors want to know that you've been writing recently. You sound like you want to break into it. That's a challenge. You might even have to write some articles and then pass them around for publication on spec. Nobody says breaking into freelancing is easy. The main thing is to develop a working relationship with editors. >> I take offense to the notion that freelancers are just taking ideas from other publications. Why? It's part of the creative process. I was just listening to an interview with the founders of the Philadelphia International Records. (To the musical luddites, PIR dominated soul music for most of the 1970s with one smash hit after another for about 20 years with a distinctive orchestrated sound that became ubiquitous with blacksploitation flicks.) Anyway, they said some of the lyrics to their biggest hit "Love Train" were borrowed word for word from a Motown song (I forget which one.) PIR generated a lot of great ideas, but the men behind it were humble enough to admit that listening to other artists and learning techniques from others, such as Phil Spector, inspired them. There's nothing wrong with a freelancer reading other work and getting ideas and reformulating them (or not, just writing the same idea for another pub in a different market). My point was to say that the marketplace of ideas works as much to the benefit of freelancer as it does against them because they can appropriate ideas (either tweaking them or not) and make them their own. >> It sucks, but it sounds like it is way too easy for Editors to just pass along your idea to someone they know, like and trust. This makes it seem like submissions are strictly for getting ideas. . . Yes, it is. And a bad editor is somebody who farms ideas from freelancers and doesn't have any of his or her own. I don't think that happens very often though (or at least with editors who stay and aren't fired for not pulling their weight). As somebody suggested, freelancers seem to not recognize that editors have a field of writers and those writers are on top of their beats. If you pitch an idea in a certain beat, and there's a staff writer at the publication that is also following that beat, it's not likely that your idea is unique or something that staff writers haven't heard of or considered, or even have in the works. In fact, it very vain for freelancers to cherish their ideas to such a degree as to think nobody else could have thought of them. Also: writers should focus on the craft of writing, interviewing and execution and concentrate less on generating a bunch of ephemeral ideas. >> . . . and if they happen upon a brilliant writer (unlikely) they might give them a shot, if compelled. You know, I've thought the same thing. You stole my idea! :) But seriously, that's probably a very good point. In fact, I recently submitted an original idea, a completed first draft of a story. I was sickened when it was rejected - and I was submitting it to a literary publication that doesn't PAY. The truth was that my article wasn't up to snuff with said publication. And it was a disappointment because I really thought it was done well. I was disappointed because I held the article to a much higher esteem than the editor of the publication. I hate when that happens, but what you say is so true: if the writing shines, the idea behind the writing doesn't even matter. |
| tmartin | Posted – 12/7/2008 4:08:01 PM | show profile "Why? It's part of the creative process" You can also always choose to keep your creative process purely internally driven - i.e., no outside queries considered, and make that really plain and clear on every directory and listing related to writer's markets and on your own damn website too. This will indemnify you to the charge that you're fishing for a broader catch of ideas beyond your inept internal staff. Plenty of publications go this route. So your internal editorial staff is so great? Fine, let them earn their keep fully by doing as you say since there's no thing under the sun as a new idea and so they should be able to find the best ones on their own since they're so brilliant, no? The boundary between freelance and staff is a mere piece of paper, a factoid which you and that troll onmyown conveniently overlook, but no matter. Those of us who have been in both positions understand the reality of the publishing world as opposed to the illusions that some others on mediabistro enjoy perpetrating. |
| onmyown | Posted – 12/7/2008 4:23:15 PM | show profile Chucho nailed it again Freelancers, read this from Chucho's post. It is the truth. Amen. *As somebody suggested, freelancers seem to not recognize that editors have a field of writers and those writers are on top of their beats. If you pitch an idea in a certain beat, and there's a staff writer at the publication that is also following that beat, it's not likely that your idea is unique or something that staff writers haven't heard of or considered, or even have in the works. In fact, it very vain for freelancers to cherish their ideas to such a degree as to think nobody else could have thought of them.* |
| Metro Writer | Posted – 12/7/2008 5:46:13 PM | show profile Chucho, you wrote: "I find that freelancers tend to want commitment from editors before actually doing any work for the story. But if freelancers choose to do it this way, then they risk having their ideas "stolen" because to sell a story you haven't written, all you have is the idea, which doesn't belong to you -- it belongs to everyone. You words, on the other hand, are another matter." I guess you haven't freelanced in a long time. Most of us write a story once we get the assignment. That's the initial commitment. Once the contract is agreed upon, then we start the story. |
| chucho | Posted – 12/7/2008 7:29:05 PM | show profile Metro brings up a very good point. As I said before, submitting work on spec is not a popular notion, for good reason. Doing work before commitment is a gamble. This is not how professional, established freelancers with working relationships with editors would or should (or have to) do their work. But the question is for those breaking into the field, esp. those without a compelling portfolio of good clips. I think it's much easier to culture relationships with new editors if those ideas come with a solid portfolio. Ideas with weak portfolios and no clips are just ideas. There is no easy answer to people who are getting started, or shifting careers from PR or editing, except, and I think this is a legitimate consideration, that you submit articles on spec if you have no other options. Put it this way: I don't hear successful freelancers complaining about editors stealing ideas. They seem more concerned about other freelancers stealing their ideas. And they're very possessive of their contacts list, for good reason. I think any successful freelancer strives very hard to have positive relationships with any editors who pay a satisfactory amount of money or could provide consistent work. Even if they feel an idea is appropriated, a good freelancer has quite a few ideas, and usually a few stories on the burner to keep him or her busy. |
| tmartin | Posted – 12/8/2008 11:04:22 AM | show profile I guess you haven't freelanced in a long time. Most of us write a story once we get the assignment. That's the initial commitment. Once the contract is agreed upon, then we start the story. Exactly so. Not only is Chucho and his alter ego basically clueless about the entire freelancer-editor interaction, he goes on backtracking and contradicting what he initially states and infers. I would add that working on spec is common enough practice not only in the initial stages of working with outside contributors, many publishers just make it standard ongoing practice no matter how long or often they've been working with freelancers. Many will not ever provide written contracts and operate on the basis of a verbal agreement or exchange of emails. But again, if any publisher is so self-sufficient that they don't need freelance pitches - then why on earth are they listening to them or accepting them? Why not do like publishers who are consistent on this issue and state upfront that they don't accept outside contributions and will not consider queries? The whole problem of "stolen ideas" is thus equally the fault of that type of publisher who wants to have their cake and eat it too. So much for hitting the nail on the head! |
