4 ms·

Journalists are paid by the word. There is no incentive for being brief (and not wasting the time of the reader)

by nn3 12y ago

dj-wonk 12y ago
TS;DGP (too short; didn't get paid)
jewbacca 12y ago
Is this actually true? It's pretty hard to believe, I honestly feel like you pulled it out of your ass, but it's also possible I'm totally out of touch. This article is a "feature" (not entirely sure what that implies) in a scientific journal (targeted towards a relatively general audience, compared to other scientific journals). Is this particular publication, or this type of publication, known to pay by the word? Which other publications pay by the word? Is it more common in some areas of publication than others? How could such an incentive-perverting mechanism not have died off by now? Do any companies still pay/evaluate their developers by lines of code written?
- chc 12y ago
  I used to work in newspapers and it's still pretty common in that industry. But they also usually give you a word count to hit, so it's not like you can just write yourself a Mercedes.
- benbreen 12y ago
  In my experience, big sites that crank out short articles like the Atlantic online, Slate, and Vice pay a set rate per piece, but longer-form outlets like Aeon and Nautilus pay per word. I've never written for a print-only magazine but I've heard that they still pay per word by and large. And I should add, the academic journals I've written for pay nothing at all!
devindotcom 12y ago
I was paid for the word once and let me tell you, if they said 1500-2000 words, you can guess which end of the range I took. But that situation was very rare and in the other five or six jobs I've had in the journalism world, it hasn't been the case. And in fact journalistic style is to pack as much into the first sentence as you can. This is a long, analytical feature piece by a major journal's news department. If you want the brief version, find a rewrite by AP or a blog.

Journalists are paid by the word. There is no incentive for being brief (and not wasting the time of the reader)

by nn3 12y ago

Journalists are paid by the word. There is no incentive for being brief (and not wasting the time of the reader)

dj-wonk 12y ago

TS;DGP (too short; didn't get paid)

jewbacca 12y ago

Is this actually true? It's pretty hard to believe, I honestly feel like you pulled it out of your ass, but it's also possible I'm totally out of touch. This article is a "feature" (not entirely sure what that implies) in a scientific journal (targeted towards a relatively general audience, compared to other scientific journals). Is this particular publication, or this type of publication, known to pay by the word? Which other publications pay by the word? Is it more common in some areas of publication than others? How could such an incentive-perverting mechanism not have died off by now? Do any companies still pay/evaluate their developers by lines of code written?

chc 12y ago
I used to work in newspapers and it's still pretty common in that industry. But they also usually give you a word count to hit, so it's not like you can just write yourself a Mercedes.
benbreen 12y ago
In my experience, big sites that crank out short articles like the Atlantic online, Slate, and Vice pay a set rate per piece, but longer-form outlets like Aeon and Nautilus pay per word. I've never written for a print-only magazine but I've heard that they still pay per word by and large. And I should add, the academic journals I've written for pay nothing at all!

devindotcom 12y ago

I was paid for the word once and let me tell you, if they said 1500-2000 words, you can guess which end of the range I took. But that situation was very rare and in the other five or six jobs I've had in the journalism world, it hasn't been the case. And in fact journalistic style is to pack as much into the first sentence as you can. This is a long, analytical feature piece by a major journal's news department. If you want the brief version, find a rewrite by AP or a blog.