Beware of Bad Writers

Totally agree with you, mate, about dishonest writers sending fake examples. I had this experience recently. The samples I saw were of so much higher quality. What I received was spun garbage that probably normally goes for $3-5 (I spent much more than that). I eventually got it sorted, but they were slow and incompetent to rectify the problem. I wouldn't use their services again.

I only found one writer I can rely on in terms of quality (but I do not always have motivation). Me!

Out of curiosity, whose (thread OP?) and which country? The only thing useful for me about premium membership would be to see this without having to engage in a PM. I don't care where someone is from, just hate when they lie about it.

 

Yeah, that really p*sses me off as well, I know why they do it, but i just assume they are ashamed of where they're from...sad really.

 

Another one I just had (kind of stupid of me, but he seemed to have a good reputation) was to give some money after the first article (it was good). Well, the next two articles were - how do I put it politely? I am sure monkeys pooping on a keyboard could do better*. (Assuming they did it with enough force to cause key depressions.) I want to leave a review in their thread, but in a way that the post will remain and won't be deleted due to me being - "unkind", I guess would be a good choice of words.

*OK, maybe an exaggeration, but there was a significant enough discrepancy in quality to leave me very surprised. This just re-affirms to me that I need to keep writing my own content.

 

See, I keep getting frustrated because I'm relatively new to freelance writing and I keep seeing people like you who are frustrated and feeling like they can't trust writers any more. It makes me think 'Wait, you haven't met me yet!' haha

Don't lose your faith.

Also, I think it's valuable to hear the negative feedback, both for the writer and the potential buyers. Perhaps just try to make it sound objectively informative and constructive. lol

 

Well, trust takes time to build up. My longest standing writer (still with me now) had some issues in the past with delivering articles on time. I give my writers a strict deadline, and when I don't hear from them on time, I tend to think that the writer is being irresponsible.

Anyway, this writer that I'm working with came back and told me that he was sorry for what happened and asked humbly if we can continue to work together.

I said yes and till today, we are still working today. Much better communication, everyone is happy. Come to think of it, we have been working for about 4 years now. Pretty amazing. That type of trust is hard to replace.

 

Too late, I've lost faith. Too many times in life I have learnt the lesson, "don't rely upon anyone except yourself." People often disappoint for simple things, which is especially annoying when you pay them.


If you are a good writer, don't go the route of writing for scraps. Instead, look to Danny Sullivan, if you are into factual reporting, or Matthew Inman (OK, so it's not strictly writing but the point is in how he markets himself), if you are good at making people laugh.

 

Haha Perhaps someday I'll follow in their footsteps (at least Danny's, I'm not that funny when I try to be), but I'm more likely to finish one of the countless novels I've started and shop that around before that happens.

 

Good luck with that. It's lucky we're in this internet age as it's so much easier to be independent of "publishing houses". Various ways to self-publish (electronic and paper), market yourself online (one of the main ways these days), in particular through social media (including sites like GoodReaders.com).

OK, this is going a bit off-topic now. Back to bad writers...

They should all be hung on display in DP Square! (If it had one...) Let's throw tomatoes @ them.

 

Better yet, let's cluster bomb them so they lose all their rotten content.

 

I can't stand most middle man "writing" companies. They are one of the reasons I left DP and freelance writing for so long. Of course, another reason was to concentrate on finishing school. I'm almost done with my Journalism degree and I came back on here just yesterday to see about getting some freelance work since graduation is on the horizon. I plan on writing freelance upon graduation, but I will be much more careful who I choose to write for. I agree that some writers are dishonest, just as some of those hiring us are dishonest. I have had people promise to pay, and NOT. I've had people have extremely unrealistic expectations about the length of time required to write a quality paper or article, even though I'd warned them in ADVANCE it may take 3-5 days. I understand a lot of writers are from other countries where English is not their first language. I realize they just need to earn a living and I can't blame them for trying. You cannot expect top quality articles from these people at dirt cheap prices. It's just not going to happen. If you are paying less than .01 or .02 cents per word, you are most likely NOT going to get top quality writing. If you are paying dirt cheap prices, you can reasonably expect to get substandard writing. I firmly believe that "you get what you pay for!" because if something SOUNDS too good to be true, it almost always is! Best of luck!