But of course the other reason to do it this way is that I have a voice and an audience, a non-trivial portion of whom are writers and other creative people, and I think it’s useful for someone who’s had a reasonable amount of success in his chosen creative field to say this sort of stuff out loud. The sort of person who expects work for free, and/or preys on creative people by trying to convince them that working for free “is how it’s done” benefits when creative people are publicly silent about this sort of crap. So this is me saying to creators: Guys, in fact this is not how it’s done, and you deserve to be paid for your work. It’s also me saying to people who prey on creators: Fuck you. Pay me. Pay us.
4. Also, of course, some people think that way I said it wasn’t nice. Bah. It’s as nice as it should be. You want me to do work but you don’t want to pay me? What sort of response should you expect? A hug? Fuck you! Pay me!
Pay us.
YES!!!
I don’t know. I sit in an office eight hours a day for no pay because my boss is promising me it’s giving me plenty of exposure that will pay off in the future. Why should creative people get a better deal?
(I say sarcastically, because fuck those who want labour, creative or otherwise, for nothing.)
I ♥ Scalzi.
The other point is that people tend to get what they pay for. In other words, if you want to get quality work, then you need to pay the person.
I don’t pay my brother when he comes around to fix the plumbing.
(At least not as far as the Inland Revenue is aware)
Harlan Ellison rants entertainingly on this subject, too, in this 3 minute video
It’s kind of like discovering your guest is a doctor and insisting on showing them your haemohrroids.
How much does Scalzi charge for blog re-posts?
He covers that in the post.
The only question I had about Scalzi’s “money first” view, he answered himself:
If you’re doing it for your own joy, there’s nothing wrong with not getting paid. But if you expect to make a living from your work (words, ideas, output), then you should expect to get paid, end of discussion. It takes money to live.
We may love to BBQ, but that doesn’t mean we’ll work at McDonald’s for free.