Exercise C

Assume you are writing for a special supplement on music for people under the age of 35. The supplement is designed to give readers information about different music styles and encourage them to experiment with to some they don’t know.

Write a short piece about your favourite style of music including why you love it, how it differs from other similar styles, who the finest exponents are and why, and list a couple of tracks or albums that you recommend people listen to as examples.

Image courtesy Wikipedia

sensationalist!

Here's a blog called West Aust News.

"Founded in 1828 by deported pick pocket Samuel Ramsbotten, the West Aust News has been the mainstay of sensationalist, poorly researched beat ups of Western Australia's ( non paper owning ) citizens from all walks of life for over 300 years," it describes itself.

Here's an example from the gossip column called Inside Bubba, which no doubt appears on page 2 of the West Aust News:

"Tony Cleudo, owner of Crawley eatery Little Tony's, has been spotted by INSIDE BUBBA extending the hand of friendship to female staff and patrons alike with his offer of a free Breast examination. A little known fact about Tony is that he recieved a doctorate of Breast examination from the Madam Bang Bang School of Medicine of Thailand in 1987. INSIDE BUBBA and wife and 19 year old daughter accepted Tony's gracious offer for a meal and drinks to sample and discuss ways of promoting this vital medical service to the generaly ignorant public."

Gosh! Enjoy...

the loneliness of the small-time reviewer

A bit more on reviewing.

I loved this piece by a bloke who reviews community theatre in Baltimore, USA.

The sums are interesting: he's reviewed 123 plays, and gets $55 per review.
If you read his piece, his most recent review worked out to about $6/hour.

Clearly not all freelance streets are paved with gold, or even fair emolument.
But he needs the money.

"Yes, there's a little bitterness. I have bigger visions of my role as a critic. But my critics seem to think that somehow it's my role in life to drive out there, 50 miles or so (including detours and retreads), because they have something special to show me. The world doesn't care what I write or how I write it; the actors just want the thumbs up. I can't give it to them every time..."

another award winner

Here's another Pulitzer winner that is worth a read.

Barry Siegel's piece (which is very long) was in the LA Times in 2002, and is about...what is it about? In fact, what is the form?

Is it a discourse on justice and/or suicide? Which issue here has greater prominence?

Is it a profile/s of the judge and/or the father?

The work that went into this feature astounds me.

Even though it's a Pulitzer winner, I humbly suggest it could be improved in a couple of places. The first few pars are a little uneven, or disjointed.

What do you think?

misapprehension

Using quotation marks as emphasis: it's wrong.

I like this item in the New York Sun a couple of weeks ago: "...nothing cheers me up like signs written under the impression that quotation marks convey emphasis", writes John McWhorter.

See what he says? They don't convey emphasis - at least not to conservative fuddy-duddies like John and me.

TRY OUR "FAMOUS" COFFEE..."GARDEN CITY SHOPPING CENTRE"..."BAKING BREAD FOR 100 YEARS"...the new boldface is bogus!

Picture courtesy Wikipedia

stuck

You might have seen this in the carpark at Curtin: a bumper sticker that says 'If I fail at Curtin, there's always Centrelink'.

Of course, someone has crossed out Murdoch and put in the name of what used to be called the Department of Social Security.

I wonder if the Murdoch student guild produces similar stickers?

I guess it's all in the name of friendly inter-varsity rivalry...

AWM review

Many thanks for your AWM reviews today. You did it! (wrote a review and filed it on time).

Here's my review. It was for Scoop, the quarterly mag for media section members of the MEAA.

What do you think? Is the opinion expressed adequately? Is there any cliche?

See you next week...

Boning up on Bacon Busters.

A book that lists contact details for hundreds of Australian newspapers and magazines is very light on for WA content.

The Australian Writer’s Marketplace promises to have “every contact you will ever need to succeed in the writing business”.

And in between AAD Outlook (circulation 500, 11 issues a year, for deaf people who use sign language) and Zoom (circulation 25,000, monthly, for rev-heads interested in modern, modified cars) there are lots of listings.

But where are the WA magazines and newspapers for keen freelancers to discover?

Freo-based foodie mag Spice? Not on the menu. Women’s lifestyle magazine Flourish? Not flourishing in the AWM – if there was, it would be between Flooring Magazine (10,859, bimonthly, floor coverings industry) and FM (6900, bimonthly, facility management).

There’s no joy with better-known WA publications, either: Perth Woman, Vita, Xpress, Post Newspapers and the Midland Echo – none get a guernsey.

Even David Hogan’s Scoop (the glossy lifestyle mag, not this august journal) is absent, and that’s been going more than 10 years.

No mention of WA’s Have-a-Go News, a monthly paper for the over-45s (but there is something called Bonzer! – “engaging stories and article of interest to seniors”.

Some local publications do get a mention. The Fremantle Herald is in, as is The West Australian, The Sunday Times, and Borderlands (“a magazine of high-quality Australian science fiction, fantasy and horror stories” with a Bayswater postal address and a street location in Nedlands).

With glaring omissions like these, how sure can you be about the comprehensiveness of the rest of the AWM?

It does have a lot of listings. There are eight Australian magazines or journals whose titles begin with numbers, including 101 Landscaping Ideas, 3D World, 4WD Monthly and 50 Something.

In the Australian magazine/journal pages there are more than 800 listed publications. Even the most dedicated freelancer will find new markets to pitch to.

There’s Urban Hitz devoted to hip-hop and R&B, and premier trucking magazine Truckin’ Life.

It’s pretty easy to pick up what some magazines are about: Houses, Earthmover & Civil Contractor, Mother and Baby, Fish and Boat.

Others take a little guessing. Beanscene (16,000, quarterly) is for coffee lovers and literate baristas. OutOfOrder is for expressing views that are outside the mainstream.

Bacon Busters has a niche market stitched: it’s Australia’s only magazine dedicated to pig hunting and likes “how-to” stories, technical advice, pig dog profiles (“what sort of kibble (dog food) do you have before a hunt?”) and the country’s biggest collection of pig hunting photos.

But others are more arcane. Jetsetters is aimed at kids aged between 5-16. GROW is for Christian kids (it stands for “God Rules Our World”). The Quorum isn’t about meetings but the business tourism event industry (12,000, bimonthly).

And in the country/regional/suburban newspaper section there are some promising-sounding opportunities: Arash is the go if you have a scoop with a Persian or Afghan angle, while Australian Cotton Outlook is undoubtedly essential reading for busy cotton growers.

What about payment? Who’s got the big bucks? According to the AWM, quite a few don’t pay anything at all.

A common note in listings is: “Published without payment” – so goodbye Australian Deer Farming, the Oakey Champion and Vicdog (11,680, monthly, Victorian Canine Association members).

And there was this frank admission about freelance submissions from our very own Chook (Fremantle Herald): “Please note that most will be unpaid”.

“Published without payment” and “payment at editor’s discretion” is vague but common.

Payment rates are rare but The Quorum is an exception – the standard rate is $425.

Is the AWM worth buying? It could be a useful resource.

WA freelancers probably know their market backwards, so learning about markets in other areas is a good idea.

As well as listings, there’s stuff on literary events, awards, competitions, fellowship and grants; markets for scripts, information about publishers, literary agents, publishing services and writers’ resources.

It was good to see the Media Alliance gets a mention: the Alliance’s WA Branch is entry #1760, on page 576, in the WA section of Australian Industry Organisations.

There are also some articles from experts and gurus. John Birmingham has a piece called ‘So You Want to be the Next Dan Brown?’ and Denise Cullen provides advice on how to write for inflight magazines.

Not bad. And AWM’s cost is almost certainly deductible or depreciable to some extent (check with your tax accountant).

Shame about the missing WA entries, though …

The Australian Writer’s Marketplace
Queensland Writers’ Centre, $49.95

Boomtown

A new local magazine might/should hit the streets soon...

The details are here: http://www.boomtown.org.au/boomtown_prospectus.pdf
(It's a 1.3MB PDF, and quite wordy).

No word here on what they pay, so I rang Patrick Pittman: he says they "can't do 50 cents a word or a dollar a word", but they can pay a "reasonable amount".

(What's that phrase often seen in the AWM? 'Payment at editor's discretion'.)

The launch isn't this week: it's likelier to happen at the end of October.

"It's from here, but not about here," Patrick told writepopmag.
"There'll be a strong WA base of talent."

What do you think? Will it enliven the local publishing scene, or will it attract the attention of that dying magazine guy?

See you later this week.