Comments on: Keating Five Scandal Needs More Deep Throat Action

By: nojo

nojo — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 00:01:31 +0000

@redmanlaw: "That was a nice job you did remodeling the kitchen, but I decided I only need the microwave, so here's a partial payment."

By: mellbell

mellbell — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 23:53:01 +0000

@SanFranLefty: I told a guy at a party recently that I really enjoy cite-checking. He reminded me that thorazine is cheap these days.

By: SanFranLefty

SanFranLefty — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 23:41:22 +0000

What, nobody is going to weigh in on the Blue Book? I drive my law student interns batty with my neurotic adherence to BB citation style in everything they turn into me. @redmanlaw: I think I bought that issue of People.

By: redmanlaw

redmanlaw — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:40:54 +0000

@nojo: Got a 50 percent spike fee from [film magazine] when a long story they assigned me on [redacted] didn't turn out to be the hatchet job they hoped for. Kept me in beer, gas and pizza for most of a semester in law school. Mrs RML was a People mag stringer for a while til she got sick of it, and covered Julia Roberts' wedding here in New Mexico.

By: flippin eck

flippin eck — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:19:09 +0000

@nojo: Editing just barely pays the bills, but you're right that it's got an edge on writing finance-wise. For example, right now I'm posting on a blog while several writer invoices sit in my in-box, waiting to be processed...and waiting. As to Chicago vs. AP, I come down on the side of Chicago for two reasons: 1. I hate the way AP is alphabetically organized and I can never find what I'm looking for. 2. 1. I dearly love the serial comma. No one has to typeset by hand anymore, dammit, so you can spare one extra measly comma for clarity's sake!

By: nojo

nojo — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:17:45 +0000

@Ewalda: That's a design/programming question, and one I plan to attend to as time permits. One of the reasons I ran "recent comments" above the fold was that it serves as an ad hoc indicator of popular threads. (That, plus I think comments are where the action is.) But there's more work ahead to highlight greatest hits, latest post per blogger, and so on, all without making you feel utterly, utterly lost when you visit.

By: Ewalda

Ewalda — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:10:09 +0000

This is such a great thread. Can’t we keep it above the fold forever?

By: nojo

nojo — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 21:06:06 +0000

@redmanlaw: Back at the quarterly alumni mag, the policy when I got there was to pay on publication — which meant it could be months between when you did the work, and when you saw the (pitiful) coin. And the spike fee was something like 10 percent. I quickly changed that to payment on acceptance. Whether we ran the piece or not, whether it got bumped for reasons outside our control, as far as I was concerned, the writer did the work requested, and the contract was fulfilled. After all, I got my check every month, no matter what. With bennies.

By: redmanlaw

redmanlaw — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 20:58:10 +0000

@nojo: Just wrote a mini bio for a magazine piece to run in January. Still have not gotten paid, so, yeah.

By: nojo

nojo — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 20:52:00 +0000

@rptrcub: Don't Be Evil. Then again, part of my toil was for an alumni magazine, so I know exactly what you're talking about. Comfiest job I ever had -- and annual contracts!