Do you browse the archives before you write?
By Jellen
@Jellen (1852)
United States
March 5, 2009 1:16pm CST
I have to admit, I seldom browse the archives of Associated Content before I write. When I've done it, I always come away discouraged and I drop the topic idea altogether, because there seems to be plenty on the topic already. But if I write on the topic anyway and put my own twist on it, my own title, my own keywords, AC ends up paying upfront for it. So I skip the discouragement and write the article in the blind. What about you?
3 people like this
5 responses
@scheng1 (24649)
• Singapore
13 Mar 09
Seldom do that, I do read a lot of articles for the sake of reading, not to find out how many people have written on the topic.
As international writer, I am not eligible for upfront payment in AC. Helium does pay upfront, so I write for Helium and display the same article in AC as display only.
Without upfront payment, it takes a long time to earn. I started writing a month ago, till now still less than $1.50.
@Jellen (1852)
• United States
13 Mar 09
That's interesting. I started at Helium, but became disatisfied with not earning there. Moved to AC and got declined more than accepted. But stuck with it to learn what they accept and how to write what sells. It's too bad for the out of nation writers, because I know a few who would do well with AC articles. They too, have to just put up for display only.
@scheng1 (24649)
• Singapore
13 Mar 09
Helium system of writing to a specific title, plus the rating system can discourage a lot of writers. No point having an article rank 128/199, nobody will read the article in that rank. But Helium has upfront payment. Plus for a new writer, the rating system is a very tough teacher, I guess I learn to be a better writer from the rating system.
I just had a very painful experience from AC. I posted a long discussion under "Writing". Plagerism is a writer nightmare, and AC's action upset me a lot. Take a look at it, and check out the AC forum. The writing community in AC is really very kind and supportive.
@desertdarlene (8910)
• United States
8 Mar 09
I haven't really been writing on AC that much, but I do go around and look at the other slideshows and articles. Most of my content has been local or personal experience, anyway, so I know that nobody has written about it.
@flowerchilde (12529)
• United States
5 Mar 09
Heck no, the pay would have to be much more before I would.
@ErrollLeVant (4353)
• United States
5 Mar 09
I have never looked at the archives of any website, but I don't write on sites like AC.
@hcromer (2710)
• United States
6 Mar 09
I don't check through the archives first to see if someone has written about the topic already. I checked it with the last one I did, but out of the 115, that puts me at checking it less than 1% of the time. I don't care if other people have written about the topic, I'll take my chances and see what happens! :)
