Freelance journalists getting nickeled and dimed?

The Guild freelance unit has a plan.

By Rebecca Rosen Lum

“Citizen journalism." The phrase has a certain democratic, Mr.-Smith-Goes-to-Washington ring to it.

But publishers’ beeline away from skilled journalists toward Everymen who will work for free or cheap is part of a larger trend that serves ultimately to torpedo democracy. For without a robust, untethered and principled news media, the idea of democracy is just that – an idea. An exercise in theory.

It should come as no surprise that enterprising, rigorous journalism — the kind that nourishes a democracy — is costly. It’s costly because it is time-consuming and labor-intensive, and requires skill, both depth and breadth of knowledge, resourcefulness, vetting. That’s before we even get to writing with elegance and impact.

Seldom a day goes by that a posting does not appear on Craigslist seeking skilled writers so bursting with “passion” for the topic at hand that they are willing to devote hours of investigative reporting for the thrill of “exposure.” Ironically, many of these employers represent do-good nonprofit organizations, such as “JustMeans,” which offers roughly two cents a word for the thrice-weekly, quality postings it demands.

Resist, cries news media analyst Alan Mutter.

Mutter (“Reflections of a Newsosaur”) lit a match to a combustible topic this week when he pilloried publishers, including online content providers, for failing to pay journalists an honest buck for an honest day’s work – and challenged journalists to reject substandard pay. Read his full column here.

“It’s time for journalists to stop participating in their own exploitation by working for a pittance – or, worse, giving away their valuable services for free,” Mutter wrote.

Publishers are also seeking more secondary rights for the same buck that once secured one-time rights, a critical change for freelance journalists, who maximized their earnings by reselling stories in multiple markets. Magazine fees have been on a downward slide for decades (One of the nation’s top-paying publications, Good Housekeeping, paid $1 a word for 40 years). Trails.com pays $15 for articles about the outdoors; livestrong.com $30 for 500-word pieces on health, writes the L.A. Times’ James Rainey in his recent piece “Freelance Writing’s Unfortunate New Model.”

“The crumbling pay scales have not only hollowed out household budgets but accompanied a pervasive shift in journalism toward shorter stories, frothier subjects and an increasing emphasis on fast, rather than thorough,” Rainey writes.

Of course, students and recent grads have long produced stories to get clips and exposure. Nothing new about that. But add to that population the number of out-of-work, experienced professionals and tanking advertising dollars, and you’ve got a set-up for exploitation.

Mutter writes that part of the problem is that we don’t value ourselves as professionals. As a reality check, we can try on the idea that it makes good sense in this tanking economy to promote legions of “citizen urban planners” or “citizen surgeons.”

Are we joining that range of low-paid workers Barbara Ehrenreich chronicled in her groundbreaking book “Nickel and Dimed,” doomed to toil at umpteen low-paying jobs to make ends meet? Is being paid per click the journalist equivalent of the sweatshop in which seamstresses are paid by the piece?

Not always, cautions San Francisco tech writer Bill Snyder, who has done well with at least one pay-per-click website.

“The only way to know whether this is essentially legitimate, or potentially exploitative, is to have some experience with the company,” Snyder said. “Without it, who knows? Which is why it makes a great deal of sense to track freelance employers and share the intelligence.”

At Guild Freelancers, that’s the plan.

One of our primary goals is to develop a “Fair Freelance” seal, modeled after Free Trade certification, for publishers who value our work . The sites that pay two cents a word — if that — will find themselves listed on our Wall of Shame — and the recipients of an Amnesty International-style, polite-but-frank letter barrage.

And thanks to Mutter, who thoughtfully provided a spreadsheet template for with his rant, we can calculate our worth.

“Journalists need to stand together – and stand tall – to reassert the stature of their profession,” Mutter writes. “The reason is simple: If they don’t put a value on what they do, then no one else will, either.”

Rebecca Rosen Lum is the chair of Guild Freelancers.

Bill would end journalist lockout at state prisons

By Rebecca Rosen Lum, special to Media Workers Guild and Fog City Journal

February 1, 2012

Bills loosening restrictions on media access to prisoners have been vetoed eight times by three California governors, but the latest version stands a chance to become law.

This month, the Assembly Appropriations Committee unanimously passed AB 1270, also known as the “California Prisons: Media Access” bill, and it is expected to sail through the Senate in March.

Of course, lawmakers have repeatedly approved nearly identical legislation in the past, only to see it fall victim to vigorous lobbying by the Department of Corrections and victim rights groups.

But neither opposes the current bill, which was sponsored by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano.

The prisons have been operating virtually free from public scrutiny, a travesty given the nearly $10 billion the state prisons take in each year in taxpayer dollars, Amminao says.

The bill would not only allow journalists increased access to inmates, both randomly and in pre-arranged visits, it would also prohibit corrections officials from retaliating against those who talk or correspond with reporters.

Since the last legislative go-round, an inmate hunger strike delivered a public relations pounding to the corrections department and its use of extended isolation in underground, windowless cells and other abuses in Secure Housing Units (SHU).

Prison officials barred reporters from interviewing the inmates during the July action, which grew out of the maximum-security Pelican Bay Prison and spread to include more than 6,500 prisoners.

“It was near impossible to get unbiased information about what was happening due to these restrictions,” Ammiano said in his statement. “Inmates kept in secure housing units (SHU) have no visitation or telephone privileges and information about their solitary confinement punishments are largely unknown to the public even though a disproportionate number of inmate suicides occur in the SHU.”

The state clamped down on media interviews in 1996, abruptly closing the curtain on the state’s penal institutions, ostensibly to avoid glamorizing convicted felons and re-traumatizing their victims.

Theoretically, the state already provides media access. But to interview an inmate, a reporter must wait for weeks as the request percolates through the prison bureaucracy. If and when the request is approved, the reporter may have to conduct the interview under the watch of a prison employee. Notebooks, records and camera are forbidden. And prisoners are not entitled to write to journalists in confidence.

Crime Victims United has “fought and fought” to keep similar bills from becoming law, said president and chair Harriet Salarno. But the statewide organization has withdrawn its opposition since the current incarnation requires crime victims to be notified of interview requests.

“That’s the way it is in Sacramento,” Salarno said. “You work things out. It was going to go through without any notification. We fought hard. We had to compromise.”

While Gov. Jerry Brown in a previous term created the Inmate Bill of Rights, which included media access to prisoners, journalists and free speech advocates say there is no guarantee Brown will sign Media Access, presuming it passes.

“That’s the $64,000 question,” said Jim Ewert, legal counsel for the California Newspaper Publishers Association, which supports the bill along with the Pacific Media Workers Guild.

“Fast forward to 2011, 2012, and you have a governor who has taken a very hard-right turn,” Ewert said. “In a post-mayor mood has aligned himself with law enforcement in a way he never would have done in the past. That gives me extreme pause.”

Ammiano’s office calls Media Access “an extremely modest bill.”

“This bill makes it possible for the media to have access to prisoners, but it in no way guarantees it,” said aide Quintin Mecke. “Victims are going to be notified, wardens still have discretion.”

Supporters include the American Civil Liberties Union of California, California Broadcasters Association, California Newspaper Publishers Association, California Public Defenders Association, Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, California Families to Abolish Solitary Confinement, Drug Policy Alliance, Fair Chance Project, Services for Prisoners with Children, Media Workers Guild and the California Correctional Peace Officers’ Association, which includes prison guards and parole officers.

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