Blogging - The New Shit Job for Interns?
Wednesday, July 30, 2008 by Kelly Sutton While Chris and I were at a party this weekend in San Diego running around getting some shotgun footage for episode 35, pitching HackCollege to normal party-goers got them talking about two things: online identity and blogging for their summer jobs. It was interesting to hear what fellow interns are doing for the warm months of the year.
A few gals started talking about their summer jobs. Many of them had jobs for low-profile magazines, such as 944. It seemed that they were set loose and just told "go blog about stuff." Summer internships have their lulls--which are often filled with 3-hour YouTube binges--so why not blog about them?
Hate to say it, but even hip magazines are gutting it when it comes to blogging. Just because you publish it doesn't mean that it will get read. None of the girls mentioned anything about the technical requirements of blogging (SEO and such) or creating a two-lane highway of dialogue. Instead, they are told to blog about whatever and forget about the content afterwords.
Have You Heard of This Thing Called Blogging?
Blogging is regarded as an experimental, mysterious form of technology. But those who know how it works are going to get ahead in their summer job. If your employer has you endlessly crapping blog posts into outer space, try suggesting that they change their ways. Mention search engine optimization (SEO). Tell them about the importance of leaving comments on other blogs. Tell them that it's important for each author to have their own page and RSS feed. Then ask for a bonus.
So what do you think? Does your summer employer have you regurgitating their print information online in blog form? Or do they have you doing something else? And is blogging important enough to pay someone nothing minimum wage for?
Reader Comments (10)
[...] I wrote a post about it HackCollege. Check it out: Blogging: The New Shit Job for Interns? [...]
Whatever the employer has the intern doing, your post on making the most out of summer internships would have the intern create some opportunities and be proactive about their work. If you have been told to "just blog" then something is inherently wrong and your should do something about it.
First of all very attractive pic of you guys :b!
And now i am gonna stop listing thing(s) and tell you that it's not everywhere that people even heard of the term blogging! It's almost that everybody on the Internet has a second hidden life, like a lot of super heroes, and everybody else don't understand the language we talk... Now i am just for the fun of, so i am gonna stop.
Period.
A new lowpoint in America: I saw a kid riding a bike with those sunglasses on.
Well now that's just foolish.
That's so great that you posted this, because I was just talking to my boss today about how my internship has gone from "one blog post here or there" to "why aren't you blogging about this lunch?" or "just blog two posts a week about anything." I'm really resisting these quotas at this point, but I think I'll give in soon. Because let's face it, it's pretty fun for a job.
And to answer your last question, no, I don't get paid anything for blogging.
I get paid for blogging, just have a close relationship with Google and CTO's of every possiable company you can find because they are the ones that normally know how to create blackholes in order to drive traffic to your site.
But,..you bring up plenty of good points...I like your content and ideas.
-David
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