you can’t pay your rent with “the unique platform and reach our site provides”

Posted on By Wil

A very nice editor at Huffington Post contacted me yesterday, and asked me if I would be willing to grant permission for the site to republish my post about the seven things I did to reboot my life.

Huffington Post has a lot of views, and reaches a pretty big audience, and that post is something I’d love to share with more people, so I told the editor that I was intrigued, and asked what they pay contributors.

Well, it turns out that, “Unfortunately, we’re unable to financially compensate our bloggers at this time. Most bloggers find value in the unique platform and reach our site provides, but we completely understand if that makes blogging with us impossible.”

I translated this on Twitter thusly:

This set me off on a tiny bit of a rant:  

I’m very lucky to not need exposure or “reach” or anything like that, at least not right now and not this way. I’m also very lucky to be able to walk away from things like this because I believe it’s the right thing to do. If I’d offered this to Huffington Post for nothing, because I hoped they’d publish it, that would be an entirely different thing, because it was my choice.

I don’t know what the going rate is for something like this. At six cents a word, which is SFWAs lowest professional rate for short fiction (not a perfect comparison, but at least something to reference that’s similar), it would be $210. That’s not nothing, but it’s not house payment money. Maybe I should have just taken their fabulous offer of exposure?

I don’t think so, because it’s the principle of the thing. Huffington Post is valued at well over fifty million dollars, and the company can absolutely afford to pay contributors. The fact that it doesn’t, and can get away with it, is distressing to me.

The exchange I had with this editor wasn’t unpleasant, and I know that she’s doing what her bosses tell her to do. I don’t blame her for the company policy. If I’d brought this to Huffington Post and asked the site to publish it, it would be an entirely different situation, I think, (I already posted it on my Medium account, anyway), but this is one of those “the line must be drawn here” things for me. I don’t know if I made the right call, but I do feel good about standing on principle, and having an opportunity to rant a little bit about why I did.

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Comments (947)

  2. We have a saying around our house (“we” are 2 working first-person actor/historians): “The only things you get from ‘exposure’ are, Sun-burn, Wind-burn, or Frostbite.”
    The more that artists continue to work without compensation, the more they undervalue the entire market for their work. They are not just hurting thenselves, they are hurting their profession. Getting paid for work that can very easily be considered ‘non-essential’ is hard, help lift us all up by insisting on being treated like a professional.

    1. I totally heard Patrick Stewart too! But on a serious note, exposure is important. People die of exposure (especially when they work for free and don’t have a home).

  7. Did you really just make an argument that you are a serious writer, and include in that argument the word, “thusly?”

    2. He made the argument that if an established publisher with an audience in the multiple-millions asks you for permission to republish your work, that that work is worth compensation. I don’t believe he made any argument anywhere about the quality of his writing, nor anyone elses’, beyond that point.

      Did a ‘grammarmonster’ really just use a final comma when neither comma nor final colon was necessary and nearly broke up the reading to the point of sounding like a Shatnerism?

      2. “…sounding like a Shatnerism?”<<
        Thank you for noticing.
        Listen, its a humiliating error, super humiliating in this context. If I was cheeky in pointing that out, take that as the bridge toll this monster charges. Typos happen. Errors happen. Some people point them out and have a little giggle. We all learn something. Don’t make this in to malice.

    3. As someone who teaches English over here in England, this seems fine to me, G-Monster. It may be old-but-not-too-old, but then some of the best words are just that. Plus it has a humorous history, so maybe Wil was just being, say, wry. (Although he doesn’t need me to interpret his tone!) Take care of yourself. http://www.thefreedictionary.com/thusly

      1. Archaic words are great! The problem here is that this error, in this context is so well documented as to turn the words back on their creator. I’d want to be told if I made an error like this. I hope you would tell your students if they made an error like this.

    5. It’s true, the most celebrated writers are known for their bulletproof grammar. That’s all writing is, really: generating grammatically correct English. Style and substance pale in comparison. And what is grammatically pleasing or correct is never subjective, because English, like any living language is completely straightforward and lacking in regional variance.

    6. Did you really just divide a compound verb with a comma when your name is “grammarmonster?”

  8. Absolutely! the number of times I get that “exposure” BS from places it is insane. As a photographer I was approached by a multi million dollar Motorcycle Rally event that is held yearly and they wanted to pay me with “exposure”…..

    Wil Wheaton for president!

  9. You absolutely made the right call. Do not doubt that. Big, profitable corporations asking people to work for free is completely bogus. “Exposure” doesn’t pay the rent. Unpaid internships for “experience” doesn’t put food on the table. If you can’t operate your business by paying people a living wage for their hard work, your company doesn’t deserve to stay in business.

  10. Bands on broadcast radio have never gotten paid for their performance. The radio industry has always used the exposure excuse to justify why they have never paid. Now that digital delivery SiriusXM is paying hundreds of million every year, the bands are rethinking the radio loophole while trying to get the web to cough up its fair share.

    1. are you talking about live performances? in that case, it is normally done to promote an album or concert. that makes perfect sense. no one is forcing them to do it. more often than not, the band’s promotion team calls the radio station and makes the request. if you are talking about a radio station paying for the songs they play, the bands do get paid through bmi or ascap royalties.

      1. BMI and ASCAP go to songwriters. If you create a beloved performance of a song written by someone else, you receive no compensation for radio airplay.

    2. Can you clarify what you mean exactly? Because royalties absolutely do get paid for radio play…are you meaning live/session performances?

  11. You absolutely made the right call. I’m tired of this idea that content creators must work for free, but still magically come up with money to pay their bills. I once had someone tell me I should give away everything I create, and use government assistance to get by. How can that even sound like a good idea?

  12. But, but, but – without free, how would Arianna make enough selling the site to investors. Did you ever think about that, sir? Huh!

  13. Under SFWA rules, six cents a word seems a bit low, it is more than a nickle though, perhaps some collective bargaining is in order. You could come up with a lot more words, just overexplain things. Once can always use extra words to be more descriptive, Yeah that will work very good. That will be tree fiddy

  14. YES! At the very least it’s the principle. We aren’t making a fortune off of our site but we do our very best to pay for guest posts. Even if it’s basically only enough to get you a week’s worth of lattes. It tells people we value them, their hard work and this industry. I’m exhausted by the disrespectful kick in the face of those who expect that our work and hard built audience is free.

  15. Good for you. I get that some bloggers have ads on their site so that “exposure” HuffPost is offering could be valuable there. But, then it should be an OPTION, rather than the norm (or the only option). They have ads on their site (in fact they like a lot of sites these days use those Gravity and other ad networks with some of the baitiest clickbait there is). They should share a % of revenue (even if that’s 1%) with a contributor. If they’re just linking to your site and not requiring you to perform an ounce of work and aren’t planning on quoting a large part of your post, I’d understand the “exposure” argument. But if they want you to actually publish the post in its entirety on their site to get the ad revenue (seemingly the only revenue they’re getting at this stage) from that, share a portion of it at least.

    I don’t know if the traditional per-word model really works on the Web (financially, I mean, not procedurally) but the way I see it: if your original content is helping them generate $1k, you’re entitled to get at least a portion of that $1k for helping make that happen. They might have traffic hit their site on a regular basis for who they are but your contribution also attracts traffic they might not have gotten.

    I remember hearing about a deal a Youtuber (with questionable ethics) did with a game that’s in early access. They basically required the game dev to pay a % of sales for a defined calendar period based on when the Youtuber’s Let’s Play video went up and a set “floor” of something like 6 months after which they figured sales sourced by their video would’ve subsided. There was no tracking (using codes or something) or any other methods of ensuring that those sales were definitely the result of the video. It was just “we’re gonna talk about it with our million subscribers and even though there was plenty of coverage elsewhere on the game, any sales that happen, we get a cut of”.

    I get the “rough logic” behind it but these days, there’s no excuse for not using the same electronic medium you’re building your business on to make revenue tracking more accurate and more viable for the people you ultimately benefit.

  16. I love this. I’m a full time pet blogger and I only accept monetary compensation for sponsored reviews and campaigns. We gotta stick to our guns and not let companies walk all over us! I wasn’t able to make a career out of blogging by accepting “exposure” in return…

  18. I now have two standard responses: My priority schedule, and my exposure contract.

    “I do high paying jobs first, then regular work, then stuff for a couple established charities that I get a writeoff for, then speculative work, and then nonpaying stuff. How much can you afford?”
    “We were hoping you’d do it for free”
    “Sure- I’ll get to it in 8-12 months, if nothing else comes up in the meantime.”
    “Well, we need it as soon as possible.”
    “Sure- My standard turnaround is X days/weeks at $Y per hour. I charge an extra $Z for rush jobs.”
    “Well, we can’t afford that.”
    “No problem. I’ll get to it whenever I finish everything else. Next year sometime, maybe, barring any other paying jobs.”

    “We can’t pay you, but it will be great exposure.”
    “Okay, so I play the show for free because it will lead to paying gigs and merchandise sales equal to $X, right?”
    “Exactly! It works out for everyone!”
    “Sure. Here’s my standard contract. It assumes I’ll make $X as a result of the gig. If it actually leads to making more than that, I pay YOU a commission of Y%, but if that income fails to materialize within Z months, you’re responsible for paying me the original $X, plus interest. Works out for everybody. Just need that signed and notarized.”
    “I don’t want to take that risk”
    “Me neither. How about you just pay me up front instead?”

    For the record, that exposure contract is a real legal document, and contains terms and penalties that pimps and payday loan companies would consider unreasonably abusive.

    I will create art for the fun of it, but I will not work for free.

  20. You should get a picture of Jenny Lawson (the Bloggess) collating paper so you can send it out when you get bogus offers.

  21. More power to you!

    Upon exiting the world of the paid, and entering the world of the hired, two of the (many) things that took me by surprise, were:

    1.) How many kinds of tape are involved in running a woodworking business. (you wouldn’t believe)

    2.) How many wealthy people and organizations have condescending reasons for getting free things. “What an honor to be recognized as worthy to [give product to] such an illustrious…” (stroke stroke) Haha…

    That article motivated me – as have a lot of the things you’ve written over the years.

    What you do is worth compensation.

    And by the way… “this” website (wilwheatondotnet) is a “unique” platform. Huffpost – not so much.

  23. So what happens when an article I voluntarily publish on a web page, without compensation, is copied by a commercial publication without permission or compensation? It’s the kind of commercial publication that puts up a paywall for me to see items, like this, there.
    Should a notice about that be included in my article?

    1. Most of the time you have already given away your right. I don’t know what kind of web page you are discussing, but the terms of Facebook, Instagram, Amazon, and many other sites allow them an unlimited, non-exclusive license to use your work in any way they see fit, without further permission from you. Read your user agreements–you’ll be quite surprised.

    1. I agree. Given your own fan base, HuffPo probably has more to gain from the implied endorsement of a byline from you than you would supposedly gain from giving them free content. JMO.

  25. Many’s the time over the years that I have been asked by commercial concerns to supply my fantasy artwork for a product for the reward of “exposure” but funnily enough when I extend the same offer to my plumber, electrician or landlord I get a “sod off!”, so I have had to pass this on!!

  27. My god. please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please, please contact that editor back and offer this post to her to repost for exposure and see what they do!

  28. Well, at least HuffPo are being consistent with their Communist philosophy by taking, taking, taking, and never giving.

  29. I heard a lot of this ‘free intern’ crap when I was going to Full Sail. ‘Free’ does not pay bills, student loans, or things like, oh say EATING.

    Oh, but there would be ‘exposure’. Probably to the elements after you cannot pay your rent!

  30. That’s sounds similar to Fox’s response when the Glee covered Jonathan Coulton’s cover of Baby Got Back. Their response was basically “we didn’t have to ask permission and you should be happy for the exposure” … despite the fact they didn’t even credit it as his version. The exposure only came because he made it publicly known.

  31. YES!!! When I first started in the blogging world, I would do these types of exchanges for exposure. That was 5 years ago. Now, I like to know that the time and effort it has taken me to be a better food photographer, the endless hours of creating recipes, the hunting and buying props for my pictures are all worth something. I’m completely over the “sorry, we don’t have a budget for this campaign” or the “here are media pictures, please share with your community” or the “we can offer you a $50 gift card to our online store.” Blogging is a skill, and bloggers should be paid for their work. Period. Show me the money!

    At least they asked, Wil. Bloggers get robbed of their content all the time. Ugh… let’s not go there.

  32. Keep fighting for, and with, us financially little people. And when we can, we will fight for you

  33. I’m a professional writer and occasional exhibited fine art photographer. It’s how I pay the bills, make frivolous purchases, and travel the world. Beyond my friends, family, clients, and customers, nobody knows my name. I could DEFINITELY use the exposure HuffPost offers (because I’m not Wil Wheaton) … but only if they compensated me financially. I don’t care if you’re a celebrity making any degree of bank, or a non-celebrity living paycheck to paycheck, your words/art/brand have a value. And if HuffPost, or any other on- or off-line media conglomerate, isn’t willing to respect that value financially, the proper response is, “Thanks, but no thanks.” Bravo, Wil!

    1. I am not sure it would even be worth the effort of writing it unless they were able to give you an idea of what kind of traffic they get on a normal day on that page or section where your work would appear. How many page views, etc. But they’ll never tell you that, I don’t think.

  34. You absolutely did the right thing. I personally get pitched at least once a day to “share this awesome and unique thing that your readers will love” by random companies, and of course they want it for free. Yeah, when I first started 5 years ago maybe (just like Maggie^ said) but not now. When I tell them that it’s the same answer, no budget. When is it going to change? When we ALL say no and truly start to value ourselves, our work and our time.

  36. Ha, yes, they deserved this response.

    I also wonder if the $200, $400, or – heck $1000 – they “saved” was worth the negative exposure this has brought them.

  37. Exposure doesn’t pay the rent, you are right, but it was a re-publish offer. If they were asking you to write for them (and only publish the post with them), then compensation from such a large and profitable company should be offered, but to re-post? I’m not so sure it was worth the rant.

    1. I’m with you on this one. They didn’t want to publish an unpublished work. They simply wanted to put his already published post on to their platform for people to read. I’m not sure why they should have to pay as if the article wasn’t out there in the first place.

      If this was an original, unpublished piece of writing, then I’d side with Wil.

  38. Here is a short list of the reasons I quit writing for HuffPo:

    1) Ariana is still a Republican at heart. As a billionaire, I find her argument for not paying writers in line with the right-wing belief that the labor class isn’t worthy of pay.

    2) The AOL merger left Ariana and HuffPo much richer, but the model remained the same.

    3) Ariana is — I’m sorry to be redundant — a billionaire. Her turn toward crowdfunding her book was repulsive to me. I am so very tired of wealthy people sucking the life out of platforms that are meant for underfunded artists.

    4) I got tired of seeing my best work relegated to some back page because, A CELEBRITY HAS WRITTEN SOMETHING AND WE MUST PUBLISH IT! I apologize, Will, I actually liked your article, but they would not have asked to republish if they didn’t think your hefty readership would come to their site. Many of the celebrity articles are not as good and some are just terribly written, but if Jamie Lee or Marlo Thomas or Alec Baldwin submit something it will make the front page.

    5) The chase for more money has left the site with a ridiculous number of affiliations. It’s not just that Oprah and Dr. Phil are part of Huff now; it’s the Daily Mail, TMZ, the Drudge Report, D-Listed and CelebBuzz. There’s no credibility in embracing gossip rags and bad journalism.

    I wish more people would just say no, but as long as there is a “platform” some writers will continue to give it away for free, hoping for some personal benefit to make up for the shortfall.

  39. Wil, I totally agree with you. It’s worse when you are any kind of “food blogger.” There are so many of them out there, all with “interpretations” of classic recipes, doing it for “exposure.” Worse than that, when you talk to groups of food bloggers about it, they chide you for not following “the way.”
    I remember a prominent food writer straight out telling me that there is no way to make money food writing. Of course there isn’t, especially because he practically gives everything away for free.
    Then again, I have something to offer he doesn’t. Experience.
    It’s sickening that Huffington Post is looking to gain financially from your experience and fame while they “can’t afford” to pay you for it.

  40. Last I heard, exposure is what kills artists when they get lost and confused in the unflinchingly cold corporate forest at night. “Nah, take my jacket I wont need it…”

  41. If he had presented the writing to Huff Post and asked them to publish it you can guarantee he would have been met with their advertising rates and a sales pitch about their reach and exposure and that it was worth it for him to pay THEM $1000 or something stupid like that. Kudos to you for standing up on this!!!

  42. I published something on HuffPo by choice, all because of their exposure and I got ZERO traffic to my site (okay, maybe two people clicked through). I like exposure, but it’s weird how my landlord likes money.

  43. I used to write for pay in Canada. I had articles published in the National Post, Winnipeg Free Press, Vancouver Province and I had a weekly column in a local newspaper called The Cowichan Valley Citizen. I stopped writing for a living when they stopped paying for my work and expected me to contribute for nothing. Now I clean toilets for a living and in my spare time I am reforming the Monetary system… http://www.tetla.org — So I wanted to ask you Wil… if I paid you in Tetla — would you consider contributing to my friend’s blog, or doing a 45 minute podcast? 🙂 Granted you would have to wait to come to Victoria BC Canadda in order to spend the Tetla you earned… but you would be able to spend it then. Cheers!

  45. You go Will Wheaton! We writers have been saying that for years…and do not allow our content to be picked up for free no matter how great the “exposure.” It is tempting, but the more writers allow their work to appear for free, all of us are devalued.

  46. SPEC work is never okay. It’s something as a Graphic Design student I feel extremely strongly about. Huffington Post should of offered something besides “exposure”.

    1. The problem is people forgot what SPEC actually means. I come up with a photo idea, i complete it X of my own money,…that is SPEC. Now i am approached by a client because they saw the work. I license the work for Y. When I have more Y than X the SPEC was worth my time, and worth doing more SPEC. The word FREE never is part of it.

  47. Will Wheaton, you are a porn star wrapped in Superman’s cape. Thank you for posting this.

    This is a huge problem.

    I have worked in media and entertainment for over twenty years and have had countless offers to do work for exposure. Practices like this and crowdsourcing are hurting the quality of creative work and killing mentorship. Consider this the next time you set foot in a media, post-production or start-up company and see a staff made up entirely of interns or people under 25. Ask what their salaries are compared to how many hours they work. How often do big companies throw a “Direct Our Next Commercial” contest.

    I have equated crowdsourcing with setting up a table between two restaurants, ordering a meal from both, and paying for the meal you prefer. What HuffPo asked you to do is the equivalent of a restaurant preparing a meal on their own dime so that Anthony Bourdain can be seen eating it.(BTW – The production company for No Reservations pays for the meals you see him eat.)

    I have seen plenty of people trying to get ideas off the ground and have asked for voluntary help, but there is typically an understanding that the favor will be returned if possible. There is no pretense that the party asking is doing you a favor by allowing you to work for them.

    I could keep ranting, but unless you are a not-for-profit this is an ultimately self-destructive practice.

    Thanks for shedding light on it.

  48. And I say, “Hey, Lama, hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know.” And he says, “Oh, uh, there won’t be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.” So I got that goin’ for me, which is nice.

  49. Mr. Wheaton, I completely agree with you. I’m starting a photography business. Even things I am planning on doing for exposure I will still be charging a fee. The reason is simple. If they get it for free now, they will balk at paying for it later.
    P.S. I hate it when anyone expects a professional to do their job for free. It can be something as simple as computer tech help. Think about it. You are asking someone who spends 40+ hours per week doing X for money, and now you want them to do it for free.

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