A Bad Experience/A Learning Experience

I recently took a job that seemed like a good fit for me. I won't get into specifics, but it was writing a self-help book about relationships. The client was aware of my background and was enthusiastic about an article I had written for him on the subject. The style was to be fun and flirty. I was enthusiastic. The client seemed nice and he welcomed me to his team, saying he would have many projects for me. We spoke a few times via skype and came to an agreement.

I sent my proposed table of contents and that's when I should have been suspicious. He wanted to make sure I didn't waste time on the "romantic" aspects of rekindling relationships. I was to stress the physical. Hmmm....

The next week, I sent what I had written so far and was told to back off of the basics and get to the descriptions of what a man could do for a woman. I started to worry.

The next week he sent me the proposed title. I will not enter it here for the same reasons I am keeping details vague. I am covering my butt. The title and subtitle were pornographic and suggested force and sexual aggression. I was appalled. 

I didn't sleep for two nights. I knew I could not write what he wanted in good conscience. I could not compromise my integrity. I was afraid that he might try to hurt my reputation if I backed out. Finally, I decided to refund the payments he had made and retain the rights to my content. He asked me to reconsider, saying that I could continue along the lines I wanted, but I did not feel I could trust him. 

I lost a good amount of time and money on that project, but I learned some valuable lessons. I cannot compromise my integrity for any amount of money. I cannot write content that will potentially hurt or lead to the mistreatment of others. I have friends and family who will support me through my struggles, no matter what. If I have any concerns, I will ensure that all client interactions are in writing. If it seems hinky, it probably is.

I am not a Facebook Whore. Are You?

This will likely offend people. Proceed at your own risk. I'm not going to mess around and rant about the evils of Facebook and your privacy being violated. That's all been done to death. I'm going to talk about Facebook Whores. We all know them. They are the folks who are using Facebook as both a personal communication tool as well as for self-promotion.

Some have two Facebook pages: one for "fans" or whatever they call it now when you "like" somebody and one regular page that is supposed to be for connecting with people. Many only have one page and they just multi-task on it. No biggie. Not my business, right? Right.

But am I the only one who furrows my eyebrows at people with over 1,000 friends? C'mon... You must be a Facebook Whore. At first, I felt inferior with my paltry 75 friends. Then I looked through them. All 75 have some meaning to me. Many of them are my creepy Internet friends - my best friends in the world. And you know what? I ignore friend requests from people I don't know. *pauses to acknowledge gasps of horror*

Yup, I don't really want to wade through anyone's status updates if I don't find them interesting. Seriously. In fact, I had almost 80 friends, but went through and dropped a few because I realized that they were people I accepted before I knew any better.

So... before you get all angry and tell me I'm an idiot and all of your 2,368 friends are honest-to-goodness pals and that I suck because I have less than 100 friends... take a deep breath. It's none of my business what you do with your account. Friend everyone. Go for it. I don't really care. But I reserve the right to roll my eyes and smirk when I look at the number of "friends" you have.

LOST in Despair: 12 Steps to Overcome my Addiction

Hi. My name is Dorothy and I'm a LOST addict. I have watched and theorized and obsessed over clues for six years. Tomorrow it will be over. I am LOST in my despair. In preparation for this devastation, I would like to share my twelve stop program for dealing with LOST addiction. I hope it will help some of you.


1. Before beginning, find your Constant. Admit that you are powerless over the electromagnetic pull of the Island and its inhabitants. 


2. Believe that a Power greater than yourself (Jacob) can restore you to sanity.


3. Make a decision to turn your will and your life over to Jacob (as you understand him - tricky, I know).


4. Make a searching, fearless moral inventory of yourself, including any and all LOST paraphernalia, randomly doodled quotes, tattoos, and fan fiction. Face your inner Man-in-Black.


5. Admit to Jacob, yourself, and someone who has no clue who Desmond is, the nature and depth of your obsession.


6. Be ready to allow Jacob to remove your defects of character and hopefully give you some wine (not muddy stream water) while saying, "Because we don't accept this as a simple potion, but so that he shall be as one with me" in Latin. 


7. Humbly ask Jacob to remove your your shortcomings and provide a recommendation for a doctor to laser off the "Not Penny's Boat" tattoo from your bicep.


8. Make a list of all the people you have annoyed by attempting to explain LOST to them when they clearly, as Eloise would put it, are not ready.


9. Make amends to those people by discussing the Real Housewives of anywhere with them. This will be painful, but it is penance.


10. Continue to take personal inventory. I know you still have that collector's edition TV Guide under your bed.


11. Pray to Jacob, as you understand him to be... even if after Across the Sea you thought he was a candidate for the short bus... to give you the power to continue to live without LOST in your life.


12. Have a spiritual awakening, realizing that the DVDs will be released, allowing you to relive your days of addiction without the added sparkle of mysterious goodness... and prepare to mourn for the rest of your life because there will never be another LOST. Ever.

Ghostwriting... Thoughts from the Spectral Scribbler

I've done plenty of ghostwriting. Articles, blog posts, tweets... No big deal. Of course, it's hard to see my work out there with someone else's name on it, but it's part of the package of freelancing. Except...

I just finished a very rough draft of a novel for a client. I was overworked and underpaid. I had to take his ideas and fashion a story around them with his input. I took the job for the experience. He knew this, and for the most part was understanding. His impatience weighed on me, as he expected FAST results. Creativity isn't always speedy. I knew this was a first draft and it would be rewritten, so I just kept heaving words at the page and making notes when I realized that I had a continuity problem or a timing issue. My client preferred that I not go back to repair things - just keep writing.

So I vomited up over 33,000 words and handed them over with mixed feelings. I'm still trying to figure all of these feelings out. On one hand, I feel good that I provided my client with what he wanted. I have a sense of accomplishment and something to add to my resume. But... I am a perfectionist and handing over a piece that felt undone was difficult for me. But... those words are mine. A lot of the ideas are mine. But they no longer belong to me.

I didn't expect to feel like I just gave a child up for adoption. Okay, that's too melodramatic, but you get the idea. I worked for so many hours, both creating and writing... and it is now out of my hands. Yes, he asked if I would look at things as he works with it, and I agreed. But will I want to do this again? I don't know.

I have felt twinges of this with some of my other ghostwritten work, but not on this scale. Maybe with some time and distance, I will feel differently. For now I think I'll just dive into my other work...

"Social" Networking

As I continue to debate the conundrum of presenting myself to the public, another interesting thought came to me. Facebook and Twitter are "social" networking sites, are they not? The definition of social is: pertaining to, devoted to, or characterized by friendly companionship or relations. Okay, got it. So, those sites are there so I can communicate with friends, right?

Well, that was true until businesses decided to use it as a marketing tool. Just try to escape blatant self-promotion or advertising on social networking sites today. It won't happen. Yes, some are successful at balancing interesting, eccentric, or informative information amidst moments of self-important advertising of their services, but many are simply in it for the business aspects.

No, there isn't anything wrong with it. It was bound to happen. And while I tweet with reckless abandon, I also don't use my real name. Yes, some know who I am, but many do not. Followers may know that I am a freelance writer, but I don't really sell my wares. If they happen to enjoy my personality and it ends up in job, great! But that isn't my goal.

Note that on Facebook, I do NOT friend people who I don't know or who were not recommended personally by someone I do know. I don't have hundreds of friends, in fact I have less than one hundred. I like it that way. I can scroll past the Farmville and Mafia Wars updates and quickly see the personal updates of my friends in just a few minutes. I can respond to them personally because I'm not wading through a lot of rubbish from people I don't care about. I like that.

Facebook and Twitter are my avenues of interpersonal communication during my workday. Working from home, while full of advantages, can be a lonely enterprise. My social media conversations are my lifeline.

My goal is to exchange ideas with a broad spectrum of people. To learn from others and explore new viewpoints. To chat with old friends and make new ones. Oh, and to have fun. If, at some point, I decide that it is important to me to use these avenues for shameless self promotion, I will have to create new pages to present myself... At the moment, though, I think I'll keep the "social" in my networking.

WYSIWYG

I was writing a press release for a client when I ran across the acronym: WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) and it made me pause. I have one identity across the Internet - on Twitter, Facebook, forums... whatever. I say what's on my mind and rarely censor myself. Is this a good thing?

In real-non-Internet life, I took that tack when I was PTA president. I told people in meetings that, while a president should be impartial, I had opinions. I would refrain from voting, but I wouldn't refrain from expressing myself. I told them to impeach me if they didn't like it. People didn't always agree with me, but they didn't want me to leave office... making it very difficult to step down when I was ready to move on.

Anyway, yesterday, someone was very nasty to a dear friend of mine on Twitter. I, of course, went on the attack. It didn't take long to put the jerk in his place. He never stood a chance. Within 4 tweets he was acknowledging his error. But... do I risk putting myself in an unfavorable light by calling a fucktard a fucktard?

I'm a freelance writer. But, more importantly, I'm a loyal friend. I do risk putting people off with my sarcasm and biting wit. Yesterday was really my first attack on anyone. It was completely justified and I am not sorry. Not in the least. But it raises this question: Should I have some separate identity online that is more restrained and professional? The very thought makes me shudder.

I am who I am. When working, I am professional. I produce excellent quality work, on anything from articles to blogs to fiction. Part of what I bring to the table is my dedication. What do you think? Do I need to try to be more politically correct online? If so, I'm not sure how to do that... I'm WYSIWYG.

Are My Eyes Bleeding?

One of my recent jobs was to write some website reviews. No problem, I've done hundreds. I received the list and dug in. I am here to tell you that I will never be the same.

Have you heard of Chatroulette? No registration, completely free social application. You click in and are suddenly face to face with a stranger via webcams. At least, that's the intention. I wasn't really ready to face strangers, so I disabled my webcam.

I won't bore you with the details. I'll get to the nitty gritty. Out of about 50 strangers, I saw a dozen teenage boys, two girls fluffing their hair, 4 balding men, and 3 erect penises. No kidding. Three guys were... um... pleasuring themselves with their webcams directed at their private bits. The first one took me a minute to process what I was seeing. I was shocked. I nexted the guy in horror. I was prepared for the second dude. I clicked on the button to report him (it probably does nothing, but I felt like a superhero - saving others from seeing that nastiness). The third perv nexted me before I could report him. I suppose my lack of webcam was a downer for him because he couldn't see my revulsion and disgust.

Bottom line, folks, Chatroulette is NOT like a fun gambling game. It's like Russian Roulette. And there are guys out there with loaded guns that they are just dying to show you. Ew.