Archives: October 2005

This is for all you out there like me who have a lonely night of work ahead of you, with scarcely the promise of a fun-sized Twix bar to keep you happy.
How do you not sully your resume after leaving a job after only one month? Just don’t put it on. Just don’t lie on your resume.

How do you ask for more money?
When is something plagiarism and when is it just lazy?
When you’re writing a roundup, is it bad if the sources don’t talk and you just come up with your own material?
And, once again: how to deal with the impossible client?

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I try to include elements of all types of writing here, so while most of you might not be writing abstracts anytime soon, there might be one tiny voice in the wilderness who is working on a manuscript they’re submitting not to the New Yorker but JAMA. (Actually, if they’re submitted to JAMA, I hope they know what they’re talking about by now. Anyway, here is a basic guide to writing an abstract, that little short bitty thing that starts off a scientific manuscript. You can find a lot more on it of course at the actual JAMA (That’s Journal of the American Medical Association) website.

As a snooty writer, I’m not sure how I feel personally about deciding that you want to write a book before you actually have an idea for one. Probably because deep down, after my years of laboring over my own half-baked ideas, I’d be jealous of somebody who went that approach and then published. But if you do work that way and get published, the more power to you and your ambition. Anyway, Nick Daws at WorldWide Freelance Writer has some ideas for your idea for a book, if you don’t have any already.

If you scroll down in this issue of Renegade Writer, you can see freelancer Damon Brown [an acquaintance of mine] discussing how he broke into Playboy magazine. It’s a good example of sticking with it–now honestly, would you keep trying four years to get into a publication? Or would you give up?

Did you want to know more about Former Literary Agent and author of The Areas of My Expertise John Hodgman? Of course you did. Rachel Kramer Bussel chats with him more in full:
Number of clients: As a Former Professional Literary Agent, I currently have zero clients, though I still frequently visit Bruce Campbell’s website (despite his so called “court-order”). During my few years as a publishing professional, I represented perhaps a dozen novelists, non-fiction authors, and stars of The Evil Dead.
Notable clients: Apart from Bruce Campbell (If Chins Could Kill: Confessions of a B-Movie Actor), and among others, I proudly represented the early works of Darin Strauss (Chang and Eng), Blake Eskin (A Life in Pieces), David Grand (Louse), the renowned mixologist Dale DeGroff (Craft of the Cocktail), and the estate of Matt Clark (Hook Man Speaks).
Percentage of fact vs. fiction in The Areas of My Expertise: As a compendium of complete world knowledge composed chiefly of amazing made-up facts, my goal of course was to avoid the merely accurate and instead embrace the strange and strangely plausible.
But the fact is some facts may have accidentally been included in my book. I suspect these adulterants contribute only 10 percent or so of total content. My goal is to reduce that to 8 percent by the second printing, and 2 percent by the 100th.

Age28
Location Paris
What are you working on now?
I’m working on a piece on sex trafficking in Italy. Not your run of the mill French burgundy wine story, although those tend to be more fun.
What has been your most difficult project of late and how did you deal with its challenges?
One of the most difficult projects I had recently was working on the subject of Islamic extremism. When you have people sitting in front of you saying they’re willing to do the impossible for Islam, it’s disheartening and even a little frightening. As a journalist, you are occasionally put in positions to confront things that you may not want to really know about; stories that make your stomach turn. By the same token, sometimes, there are stories that fill you with hope and inspiration. To deal with the former challenges, which can be rather difficult, you need to be very grounded. Family can ground you.
What’s the most helpful thing you’ve learned about writing?
The most helpful thing about writing is to keep doing it in all forms possible, don’t just do journalism, but branch out. Learn radio, film and other types of writing. Push yourself to explore the tantalizing varieties of writing forms. Do a little every day. Stay open to things, sensations, environments, moods and people when writing a piece. Try to think about structure and usually begin your stories around a place even if you’re writing about other people.
What’s been the worst advice you’ve ever received about writing/journalism?
The worst advice I received was to go to school to learn how to do it. I started a PhD program in political science, but never went to J school or writing school. Some things are better learned on the job, in life, and on the ground.
If you were to give advice to someone who was going to begin a job at a foreign office of a publication, what would you tell them (about their job, acclimating to a new place, etc?)
Working in a foreign office is fantastic. It’s worth all the hassle of dealing with living in another culture and resettling. What I would suggest is to first learn the other language, because you probably won’t have time on the job.
One of the downsides if you work for an American publication is that the foreign news often is really lacking. You are quite limited in your subject matter depending on the publication. Some editors want news that has to do with Iraq and tend to be set on the notion that Iraq is all that Americans care about reading. There is so much going on around the world that is interesting and pertinent. I get really annoyed when editors and writers get narrow-minded. The radio seems much more open to foreign news. If you work in the radio the notion that listeners only care about Iraq is quite the reverse, especially if you work for the BBC, which is much more international.
In print, for major American newspapers, often the news gets somewhat dumbed down and will probably fulfill the stereotypes you have about the world. The general assumption is that an American reader is truly ignorant about things foreign. I tend to be on the side that believes that readers can be and are much more sophisticated. Also, readers should develop the acquired taste of learning and caring about world issues. Journalists need to challenge readers to think a little so that after reading an article they come away with something new. Readers should learn a little more about the rest of the world, because we can’t avoid it. Nothing is more dangerous for Americans than ignorance about what’s happening abroad. It can come back to haunt us. Also, the important thing to remember as a journalist is that you’re a kind of modern-day historian. What will carry your story in the end is good writing and good subjects.

MBToolBox.com will be taking the afternoon off to join the ranks of long-haired, Journey-loving, greasy South-Side fans of the Chicago White Sox as we invite our second-favorite, first place team home with a parade. Don’t stop believing! I will of course give you a wrapup of what people are talking about on the boards today.
The MBToolBox topic of the week: how do you recycle and resell your story ideas?
Anybody taken a writer’s refuge?
Will taking a receptionist job at a magazine lead anywhere?
When billing a magazine for a pay-by-the-word freelance story, do I bill them for the number of words I submitted or the number of words actually published after the article was edited?
How do you break into the trade magazines?

Nobody likes grammar but editors really hate bad grammar. Michael LaRocca writes a little lesson on comma usage for you. It’s probably stuff that’s way below your skills, but nothing says fun Friday like a bit of remedial punctuation education.

One of the first times I spoke with today’s interviewee, he was telling me about a snowstorm he was experiencing on the Eastern seaboard, which was forcing him to shovel out his driveway. Along to assist him was his tiny tot daughter, who arrived armed with a miniature beach shovel. “Adorable, but ineffective,” was his verdict. What does this have to do with anything? Nothing, but it’s one of the cutest anecdotes I’ve ever heard about somebody’s kids. Anyway, I will use his professional bio to introduce him:

John J. Edwards III is the news editor in charge of production and news operations for The Wall Street Journal’s Pursuits section, part of the paper’s Weekend Edition. In that role he oversees the section’s production process, coordinating story schedules, layouts and art and serving as a liaison with other sections and bureaus, in addition to assisting with general editorial direction and line editing. He was a news editor in the Journal’s Media & Marketing bureau from April 2004 to June 2005 and joined the paper in October 2000 as an editor on the national news desk. He previously worked for 31/2 years at TheStreet.com, the online financial publication, successively as a reporter, senior writer, markets editor and assistant managing editor. He has also held reporting positions at the Times of Trenton, N.J.; Dow Jones News Service; and the Bureau of National Affairs, the Washington newsletter publisher. He received a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Northwestern University in 1992. He lives with his wife,daughter and son in New Rochelle, N.Y.

You went to the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern. Based on your experiences there and your career, how important do you think it is for writers to go to J-school?
I would say it’s generally helpful, especially if you’re firmly set on a career in journalism, but it’s certainly not a prerequisite for either success or effectiveness in the craft. I found it valuable to get a systematic grounding in the basics of news writing, and to delve more deeply into journalistic issues and challenges in classes like Law & Ethics of Journalism.
For my final project in one of my senior-year newspaper classes, I had to design and explain a newspaper of the future. I made mine a tabloid-size paper closely integrated with a computer-based news service (weren’t calling it “online” back in ’92!) that could offer more in-depth information. With The Wall Street Journal‘s European and Asian papers just having converted to compact size and having expanded their links to WSJ.com, I feel like my education helped me to be pretty prescient. Thanks, Buck Ryan!
The junior-year quarter I spent at the Times of Trenton, N.J., as part of Medill’s Teaching Newspaper program was also a huge boon, since I was able to work as a full member of the reporting and copy-editing staffs and really hone my skills in a real-world setting. (Working for four years at the Daily Northwestern was also a great experience, albeit in more of a mock-world setting.)
Journalists in general, but especially those without formal journalism training, should be eager autodidacts in approaching the field. Read, watch or listen to journalism outlets voraciously and questioningly. How could this story have been better? Where are the holes? Was it fair to all sides, yet sharp in reaching a point? Journalism isn’t a closed club, as many serious and fair-minded bloggers demonstrate daily, but just because anyone can do it doesn’t mean it should ever be done in an unconsidered way.
A caveat is that I went only to undergraduate journalism school, so I’m not an expert on graduate programs. The Northwestern faculty might differ on this, but I found that the undergrad program made an additional graduate program unnecessary. For those who majored in another area (or journalism students who weren’t lucky enough to be undergrad Medillians), or for people looking to make a career change, I’m sure my comments apply to grad programs as well.
How did you end up at the Pursuits section of the WSJ? How is it different from what you were working on previously?
Cathy Panagoulias, our assistant managing editor in charge of staffing, asked me last spring if I would be interested in talking with Tom Weber, the editor of Pursuits. I was interested, and it went from there. Previously I had been a news editor with the paper’s Media & Marketing group, mainly handling advertising coverage. Moving to a weekly section has been an interesting adjustment. So far, the hours have been longer and some of the days have been even more intense than working on the daily paper, which partly comes from the usual startup kinks and partly from the large volume of material we’re working on every week. Pursuits runs considerably more individual items than does the Weekend Journal section on Fridays, for example.
Amid all the work, there’s been a lot of fun, which was one of my big reasons for making the switch; while I very much enjoyed working for Media & Marketing and miss my colleagues there (who are a whole two floors away now), it’s great to be part of building a new section. It reminds me of my days at TheStreet.com, where I was the ninth reporter hired, back in 1997, and got a chance to grow along with the publication as we built a strong journalistic organization from scratch. At Pursuits, the budget is bigger but the spirit is similar.
What advice would you have for writers trying to break into business journalism?
One of the most important things, for business journalism and journalism in general, is to have a deep knowledge and understanding of the publications and outlets in the field. A cover letter that says something generic like “I want to work for Publication X because it is one of the finest newspapers in the world” is much less effective than one that refers to particular stories from Publication X or notes how you’ve enjoyed Publication X’s expanded widgets coverage, and how your experience can make it better. As far as breaking in on the ground floor, don’t turn your nose up at news assistant or clerk-type positions, which can be a great way for a smart, ambitious young journalist to get a foot in the door. Also, avoid employing as many clichés and mixed metaphors as I crammed into that last sentence. Your clips–always the most important part of your package–will stand out best with writing that’s original, straightforward and pithy.
Certainly helpful in business journalism these days (though not something I bring to the party myself) is a particular area of deep expertise such as forensic accounting or advanced database skills. Experience on “the other side,” as an analyst or broker, say, might be nice but would do nothing to compensate for subpar journalistic skills.
You have popped up on Gawker and McSweeney’s. Do you work much on literary humor or any genre that we’d normally consider non-WSJ-style?
My work on literary humor (and pathos, for that matter) has been on hold for the last 13 years or so, after I realized how bad my high-school and college short stories were. They were fun to write, though, so I might give it a whirl again. Look for my rip-the-lid-off-the-Journal roman à clef, “The Devil Wears Jos. A. Bank.” The Gawker interview was a hoot, but a word of advice to fellow journalists–try to let your editor know before you show up on Gawker, if at all possible (as indeed often it is not). At the moment, my main non-WSJ writing outlet is wrap-ups for the sudden-death football pool I run with a friend of mine. If you’re interested in getting in on the action next season (which is all in good fun, as far as the IRS knows), drop me a line.
You were roommates with Neal Pollack in college. Did either or your writing styles rub off on each other?
Alas, while I have bested Neal since college in steadiness of gainful employment, he remains unequaled as a satirist. At least, unequaled by me. I like to think that his rigid adherence to AP style in all of his work stems from my influence, though.

Susan Kirkland sent me two articles that may be of interest to ye:
Via Yahoo: Do women make ‘wimpy’ creative directors? “French made the contentious remarks during an industry discussion in Toronto on Oct. 6. According to a report in the city’s Globe and Mail newspaper, French said women did not make it to the top because “they’re crap.” As Susan says, “agh!!”
Also, “Just in case anyone is ‘making money’ this site will make them think twice before they commit a felony: a list of laser printers that include government spyware for tracking purposes.”