Writers Explain What It's Like Toiling on the Content Farm

Cliff notes: Writers are not experts nor experienced journalists. Some churn out articles at 2-3 per hour so they can make a decent rate when figured hourly. Some writers have other no journalistic background and writing for the experience (and no pay). The content may or may not be accurate, thus, "How to make gin" or "How to give CPR" may be of little use but it's feeding the "content farm".

From the article:
..."A lot of my friends did it and we had a lot of fun with it," said one graduate of a top journalism graduate program when asked about her work for Demand Media. "We just made fun of whatever we wrote."...

..."Although Demand pays only a meager $15 or so per piece, by choosing easy prompts and writing them up very quickly, Christopher managed to collect a tidy sum for his time and effort. Christopher forces himself to pump out a minimum of three per hour for three hours a day. "For me it's always the hourly rate," he said. "I won't [write for Demand] if I feel I can make money doing something else."...

 

wow.. interesting..im pretty sleptical of journalism to begin with.. but when it comes to health news and things of "importance", i usually look for someone with credentials such as a MD, PhD, etc

 

I disagree, if the internet says it true then it must be true.

lol

 

The sites those "content farms" supply content to are not what I'd call "journalism outlets." Not sure why anyone would think eHow.com is chock-full of journalists striving for truth lol.

Who reads the crap shoveled by Yahoo News, et al, anyway? The stories" feature zero info beyond what fits in the headline, and the "reporting" is cribbed from AP releases if you're lucky.

Is anyone else tired of being told how valuable the internet is when people point to eHow, Yahoo News, MySpace, and Facebook as "proof"?

 

sweatshops for words. wow.

 

I always hated Yahoo News. It should be called "Yahoo not news worthy or even news but we'll post it anyways."