GOING FREELANCE: An All-day Seminar on Practical Aspects of a Freelance Writing Career

Jointly sponsored by Johns Hopkins University Masters of Arts in Writing program and American Independent Writers

Saturday, November 7, 2009

The Johns Hopkins University Bernstein-Offit Building

Washington, DC 20036 (Lower-Level Conference Hall)

8:30-9:00 a.m. -- Registration and Continental Breakfast

9:00-9:15 a.m. -- Welcome

9:15-10:30 a.m. -- The Fundamentals of Freelance Business

How do you know what to charge for your hard freelance work? Or what records to keep? Or whether you’re being taken advantage of? This panel presents expert and experienced advice on rate-setting, accounting, record-keeping, legal issues, tax basics, and other nuts and bolts of successful freelancing.

John D. Mason is a Washington DC/Maryland based art, entertainment, and intellectual property attorney. His practice focuses on copyright and trademark matters, litigation, contracts, and commercial matters. He works with writers, artists, and creative people and companies to protect and exploit their work and is also a literary agent. The website for his new firm, The Intellectual Property Group, PLLC, is www.artlaws.com.

Ken Norkin is an ADDY- and ASPC Colonial Award-winning copywriter and full-time freelancer specializing in business-to-business marketing communications for technology-based products and services. Since establishing his own business—KN Creative—in 1991, he has written ads, brochures, annual reports and Web content for Sprint, Nextel, Mobile ESPN, IBM, Citrix, Carl Zeiss, Road Runner, MCI, Savin, Sharp and the American Gas Association. Beyond the tech market, Norkin has written for T. Rowe Price, Arlington and Prince William Counties, The Overseas Private Investment Corporation, Holy Cross Hospital, the Vince Lombardi Cancer Research Center, The Washington Post, PBS, the Discovery Channel and many other companies. His ability to share what he’s learned in 30 years of writing for a living makes Norkin a frequent and sought-after speaker on the business of freelancing and creative self-employment.

Alan C. Portner spent 35 years in the newspaper business as a reporter, editor and publisher throughout the country including Hawaii, California, Iowa and the metro DC area. He has spent the past five years as a freelance writer and author, as well as the president and founder of The Assignment Desk.

10:45-12 noon -- Finding Work in Commercial Writing

While we all want to publish our essays in national magazines, some of the most lucrative freelancing in the Washington-Baltimore area involves annual reports, media releases, marketing materials, and other writing-for-hire work. This session describes how to network and find the opportunities.

Lester Reingold has been a freelance writer and editor for more than 30 years, concentrating primarily on aviation and space. He has written for magazines such as Air & Space/Smithsonian, American Heritage and Condé Nast Traveler and newspapers such The Washington Post and USA Today, plus many aerospace trade publications. His first book, a pictorial history of the Wright Brothers’ home town—Dayton, Ohio—was published in 2005. He is a commentator for WAMU and for NPR’s Morning Edition. After the accident that destroyed Space Shuttle Columbia, Reingold served as Lead Editor in the investigation. Since then, he has continued to work as Publications Editor on projects for NASA. A former AIW Board member, Reingold won the 2004 Washington Writing Prize for Reported Nonfiction and was runner-up in the 2003 competition.

Vicki Meade, bio to come

12:00-1:30 -- Lunch and Networking on your own

1:30-2:45 p.m. -- It’s Time to Publish

Okay, you have a great idea for an essay or article. Now what? This panel covers the many venues open to publishing creative writing, from online and print journals to magazines and newspapers. The focus will be on publishing essays or articles, although many suggestions will help poets and fiction writers, too. We’ll discuss how to target your work, the need for persistence, and the all-important query and cover letters.

Cathy Alter's feature articles, essays, and reviews have appeared in local and national newspapers and magazines including Washingtonian, Self, Fitness, McSweeney’s, Preservation, and Might. Her book, Virgin Territory: Stories from the Road to Womanhood (Three Rivers Press) was released in 2004 and her memoir, Up for Renewal: What Magazines Taught Me About Love, Sex, and Starting Over (Atria) was released in July 2008. She holds an M.A. from Johns Hopkins University, where she is currently a faculty member.

Margaret Guroff is a freelance writer and a features editor for AARP The Magazine. She is also editor and publisher of Power Moby-Dick, an online annotation of Herman Melville's classic novel. Guroff, previously top editor at Baltimore magazine, is a graduate of The Writing Seminars as The Johns Hopkins University, where she has taught graduate and undergraduate students for many years. She lives in Washington.

Tom Shroder is an award-winning journalist, writer, and editor. As an editor of The Washington Post Magazine, a story he edited and contributed to, Pearls Before Breakfast, won the 2008 Pulitzer Prize for feature writing. From 1985 to 1998 he edited the Miami Herald 's Tropic magazine, where among others, he edited humorist Dave Berry. He has written several books, including Seeing the Light, a non-fiction novel based on the life of Dr. Ian Stevenson.

3:00-4:15 p.m. -- Fundamental Technology, Blogs, Facebook, Twitter, and Other Social Networking

New technology appears almost daily and social networking tools such as blogs are everywhere, but what technology and networking tools does entry-level (and more advanced!) success really require? This panel discusses important but easy-to-forget tips and resources for online and computing productivity and safety, as well as networking for freelancers, work-at-homers and other professionals.

Shashi Bellamkonda (aka, ShashiB) works for Network Solutions as the first-ever Network Solutions "Social Media Swami." A prolific Twitterer, blogger, and product innovator, Shashi loves technology, testing new things, and helping people. A self-described "Internet junkie," Shashi has presented previously on "How to Sell Social Media to Your Boss" and "Social Media tools for Small Business." He's been in love with social media since his previous life working in the hotel world and, believe it or not, as an executive chef, and Shashi started his blog to keep his many on- and offline friends up to date on the coolest new things to check out and answer their questions on social media and technology-from what to use and how, how to prevent pop-ups, how to avoid viruses, how to save computers from hackers, and the ever popular "Why is my computer freezing?" Shashi's life's mission is to be helpful to others and achieve dreams in installments.

Gabe Goldberg, a lifelong computer pro and technology communicator, co-edited three books and has written hundreds of articles for audiences including techies, baby boomers, and senior citizens. Gabe speaks frequently to diverse gatherings and radio audiences and supports local, regional, and national technology communities. He enjoys sharing tips and pointers that help people use and enjoy technology.

VISIT THE NEW AIW WEBSITE TO REGISTER!

• AIW Member Regular Registration Price: $89.00
• Nonmember Regular Registration Price: $129.00
• Student Regular Registration Price: $49.00

AIW Seminar Report : PUSHING THE ELECTRONIC ENVELOPE … EVEN FARTHER
by Anjelina Keating, AIW member

“Social media is not a fad. It’s a fundamental shift in communication. You need to get the concept, even if you decide it’s not for you,” declared Kristen King, AIW Board member and host of Pushing the Electronic Envelope…Even Farther, the second AIW seminar on how writers can use cyberspace to augment their careers. Attendees of the information-packed sessions, which took place in Johns Hopkins University’s Bernstein-Offit Building in Washington D.C. on Saturday, October 3, heard from 10 speakers about how social media, Web-based resources, and building an online presence can benefit any writer—no matter what kind of writing you do.   

Everyone knows that networking is a key component of any business, and in the first session of the day, four speakers discussed using social media such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter to boost one’s social network. King described LinkedIn as “a cross between an online resume and an online rolodex,” and brought up her own profile on-screen to demonstrate the exponential number of people she could connect with through her primary contacts. Jen Consalvo, co-founder of Shiny Heart Ventures, a new technology startup, had employed her online network before arriving, asking via Twitter “Any social media tips for writers u want me to share?” Another speaker, Shashi Bellamkonda, the “Social Media Swami” for Network Solutions, kept his Web contacts up-to-date by taking photos of the AIW audience mid-session with his cell phone, which he posted on Flickr and linked to Twitter. When asked by King which social media tool they would use if they could only choose one, the speakers were divided about which was the most helpful, but adroitly outlined the pros and cons of each. Austin Camacho, who has authored four detective novels, picked Facebook, with Twitter “a close second.” He uses both, along with weekly updates to his blog, for self-promotional purposes, utilizing these new technologies to help build an audience for his work. 

Nancy Shute, a contributing editor for US News & World Report, continued to sing the praises of Twitter during the next session. She uses it to follow news of interest in real time, to locate sources, to share scoops with other reporters, to suss out story ideas, and to connect with her readers. “You, as an individual, have a lot of power to market yourself as a writer because of the traffic there,” she remarked. “You can connect with tens of millions of people using social media tools.” Deborah Ager, who publishes the poetry magazine 32 Poems, pointed out that Twitter can help you keep up-to-date in your field, and allows you to interact with and ask questions of experts and authors who you may never have a chance to meet in person. This panel also discussed blogging, illuminating the ways having a blog can work to your advantage as a writer, describing possible blogging pitfalls and ways to circumvent these, and revealing the numerous tricks that help ensure your blog drums up cash and fresh gigs for you.

In the afternoon sessions, Jeff Taylor, an Online Analyst for New Media Strategies, treated the attendees to an impromptu Facebook demonstration, showing how profiles can be used to promote a company, a book, or a product, and how interest groups and discussion groups can be utilized. Taylor also suggested that Facebook could be used to gather information about a particular organization, or to network your way into a job. Freelance writer and blogger Thursday Bram divulged the names of dozens of inexpensive (mostly free) online tools useful for writers. Bram’s tips could help you with everything from keeping track of your to-do list to assisting you with invoicing—and she even revealed which ones were her favorites! In the final session, Dori Kelner, a consultant in the information technology field, Paula Whyman, a blogger and fiction writer, and Jill Kurtz, the Chief Operating Officer at Balance Interactive, discussed the do’s and don’ts of Web sites for writers. A definite ‘do’ was to have a Web site—having one allows you to showcase your work and to exert control over what others see about you when they search for your name online. The panel provided clear suggestions and instructions about how to define and implement goals, design with a target audience in mind, actively build connections with readers, and optimize Web site traffic.

This all-day event was indispensable for those writers who find the tools of the information superhighway amorphous and baffling. Even for those who don’t, the speakers provided guidance in how best to capture the incredible potential of online resources to further professional goals. Putting the pen to paper—or as the case may be in these times, fingers to the keyboard—is still the most critical aspect of writing, but these sessions made evident that capturing the power of technology is increasingly advantageous as well, and revealed the ways every writer can seize the electronic reins to help control their career destiny.

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