Posts Tagged ‘Attempts’

CASHING IN ON TRUE LIFE TALES

Friday, November 20th, 2009

Got a true life story which you think might make the tabloids sit up and beg? You know the type, My devil worshipping granny turned lesbian at 80! or My partner kept his underage lover in our coal cellar! They are more common that you think and with the huge payouts they command, it is little wonder more than a few writers have turned their eyes to this type of writing!

Payment for these kinds of magazine articles far out strips anything else on offer, typically anywhere from a thousand pounds upwards and the additional prospect of a byline in a magazine with a circulation of many thousands is a further attraction.

How hard is it then to break into this type of magazine writing? If you have something like a husband with a mistress in the coal cellar, pretty easy! Once word gets out, you will probably find buyers coming to you, but there are plenty of agencies and brokers who will be more than pleased to help you sell your story for a percentage of the fee.

These are industry professionals with good contacts. For a percentage of the fee, they will negotiate the best price for the story on your behalf, a little like a book publishing agent, but there the similarity ends because unlike the world of book publishing, it is highly unlikely that you will be allowed to write your story!

This is not a problem if you are only interested in the cash and have no real writing aspirations, but if you are seriously interested in writing for magazines, you will want to do your own writing and build a portfolio of creditable clips.

Your attempts to hold to the truth will largely go unheeded and it is very likely that you will also have to agree to photographs of yourself being spread all over the centre pages.

The good news is, you can earn a reasonably good living writing for magazines without having to paddle in these somewhat murky waters!

As long as your writing and research skills are of a reasonable level, there are plenty of magazines and websites offering good payment rates for articles.

Neither is it hard to begin making sales. The reason why most new writers struggle is they simply do not understand the business side of writing and how to provide the types of articles that will sell magazines.

You will find there is a lot of help available so do plenty of back ground reading on writing for magazinesbefore you start submitting your articles.

To point you in the right direction, you will find the two main provisos are a listing of marketswhich pay for magazine articlesand a good understanding of how to submit and make appropriate queries. Many creative writing communities compile frequently updated databases of paying markets while you can get a free copy of Mags & Rags, an excellent, course on writing for magazines which will ground you in all the basics of selling articles to magazines.

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College Football 101: A Beginner’s Guide

Thursday, November 5th, 2009

So you want to become a college football fan, but the game itself is a bit alien to you? You are not the only one. There is so much information available that even the most dedicated fans often feel lost without checking the college football analysis reports.

College football is very similar to pro football. Let’s review the basics. In a football match there is both an offense and a defense. The offense generally keeps ownership of the football, and therefore is able to score, while the defense must keep the offense from getting the football into the end zone. Teams alternate roles from offense to defense after a certain amount of plays to give both an equal chance to score. The offense or defense is decided prior to the beginning of the game by a coin toss. The visiting team is awarded the opportunity to call the coin toss. A team generally scores points only when it is on offense. The goal of the offensive team is to head into the other team’s territory and bring the ball to the endzone.

There are two ways to move the ball down the field either by running the ball or passing it to a receiver who, after receiving the ball, runs with it until he either makes it into the endzone or is tackled by an opposing player.

The defense, meanwhile, is supposed to prevent the offense from scoring. They kill the advances of the offensive players by snuffing out their attempts at scoring. Defensive players cover the offensive players, often tackling the one who is holding the ball. The defense should do whatever it takes to stop the ball from moving forward. By taking down the ball-carrier, the defense can sometimes even move the ball backward. Once in a while the defense manages to take down the quarterback while the football is still in his posession. This is known as a sack. As with pro football, the team that scores the most points wins.

It’s just that easy. So now you can impress your friends with your impressive college football knowledge.