D20 Freelance writer's wanted

[mcathro]

All,

Throwing my hat into the PDF publishing ring. Looking to hire D20/OGL freelance writers for assignments. D20 Modern and fantasy concepts. Writers should be comfortable working in the D20 system and able to run with an idea or concept. Beginning with short PDF's in the 5-20 page range. Have two larger projects in development once a good relationship is established. Can't pay a whole lot, but will pay $3.00 per page, more if it's really crunchy; rules development etc. (Willing to do a royalty arrangement if the writer prefers, but standard practice is to pay via PayPal once the work is accepted.)

Respond with writing sample(s) to mcathro@mitre.org. Willing to work with first-time writers; send a sample creature/magic item/fluff piece/adventure hook of your choosing. Thanks!

-Mark

 

[haiiro]

Howdy. Paying per page is pretty unusual -- how many words per page are you thinking of for your $3/page rate?

 

[mcathro]

The rate quoted is for a standard, single spaced page in MS Word or Open Office or whatever WP you use. Not trying to short change anyone, just easier to look at X number of pages and multiply by $$. Crunch and rules-heavy development pay more. Hope that clarifies!

 

[Stormborn]

The rate quoted is for a standard, single spaced page in MS Word or Open Office or whatever WP you use. Not trying to short change anyone, just easier to look at X number of pages and multiply by $$. Crunch and rules-heavy development pay more. Hope that clarifies!

No offense, but as a d20 Freelancer (see sig) with a little experiance of how contracts look you are going to shoot yourself in the foot paying like that. I'm not worried about being short changed, I'm worried about the book never seeing print because you have bled yourself dry overpaying freelancers. A "standard, single spaced page" is going to have significantly different content based on format, font type and size, margins, and the presence or absence of tables. If you want to pay up from rather than royalty (and I think for a start up publisher royalty based payments are the way to go) either pay by the word or determine a standard format and pay X per work based on what they are going to sell for/length.

 

[mcathro]

No offence taken, but I think you might be making this a bit more complicated than it needs to be. If a freelancer turns in a page with two inch margins, a one inch colum down the middle of the page and a 24 point font he's not going to get paid for fifty pages when it really is ten pages of Times New Roman 12 point.

Three bucks a page is akin to about a half cent a word, give or take, assuming 600-650 words a page at three bucks. (If that's over-paying then I want to hire you right now! ;-) Besides, doesn't three bucks a page SOUND like more money than a half cent a word?

Rather than word-pick I would rather pay by the project/page. Hence a ten page work will earn the writer thirty dollars. I understand pages with charts will run less word-count but I am willing to reward that kind of rules-heavy "crunch" text by including it in the per-page rate.

 

[Insight]

I have been a freelancer D20 writer, and I have to agree that the per-page arrangement is rather odd. You're going to run into a conflict with your writers if you don't spell out exactly what you want, and what you will pay for.

If you want to pay per page, that's fine. What I would do in your case is to specify margins, font sizes, etc that you will accept, rather than pay them based how much work you think it is. Remember, you're entering into a contract with your writers, and all of this will need to be specified before they write a word and you pay a dime.

Just some friendly advice. Good luck with this!

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Given that Word, etc., have built in wordcount tools, I would also suggest -- as a former freelancer who knows plenty of people who would abuse this in a heartbeat -- just paying a half-cent a word. Which, yes, isn't a huge amount of cash, but it's in the standard publishing industry format and prevents sleazy writers from taking you to the cleaners.

 

[Jdvn1]

Just some friendly advice. Good luck with this!

I think this is an important point.

I know very little about the industry, but from the responses to this post:
mcathro, be glad you're in a generous industry and listen to good advice from people with experience. For some reason, eventhough they technically may be your competitors, they're trying to help you out.

Maybe that's why a lot of businesses fail, but it's still good advice.

 

[mcathro]

Thanks for the advice guys. Looks like I am now oficially paying a half-cent a word! I appriceate the comments. I've got a couple of freelancers working on assignments so far, and can still offer assignments to interested writers.


-Mark

 

[mcathro]

Thanks again for all the advice, have hired several great freelancers! Just put the "official" website up for my PDF Publishing venture:
Skortched Urf' Studios is now live and online!

http://www.skortchedurfstudios.com/

Our first release will be out September 1st (tomorow!) with more regular releases following.