Ministry "Khyber Pass", closing scene of The Hurt Locker

I give unto you these Ten Commandments, with five being optional, your choice.

The timeline has ground to a halt, so I'm gonna bow out for this week. Don't let Bluesky problems darken your day! Thanks for chatting, everyone.

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A3a: I'm with @devonellington.bsky.social , the best thing for my outlook is getting something to the finish line, published, color it done. It gets tough when I have to close the window because stuff won't finish and more stuff comes in.

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A3: I'm trying not to allow clients more than a reasonable amount of control. Like the one that issued briefings, but not the contract, and expected me to start. NOPE. Like these clients suggesting language in a revision, I accept it, then they revise it again in the next round.

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A2: I find myself thinking "let go" a lot. It keeps me from dwelling on mistakes or misdeeds and get moving forward again. I miss being on the bike regularly, working on a return to that routine.

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A1: Worrying. Whack-a-writer is in full swing. PR firm sent briefing materials to an outdated email address for me, then the client escalated to the outlet publisher asking when their draft would be ready. Sigh. Still mid revisions on several other projects. Keep working, though.

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Gallium nitride, an alternative to silicon in semiconductors supporting higher frequencies and higher power.

Foundries serve fabless semiconductor design firms.

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In other news, I have some help this week. This is Wilson, a 9 year old tripod border collie. His mommy is on business travel, so he's been here since Saturday and has a few more days with us. He is such a blessing, loving, smart, and gentle.

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Hi, I'm Don, on the outskirts of San Antonio where Fiesta begins today. I write for electronics and semiconductor firms in my day job. Working on an article for Microwave Journal and a new byline on GaN foundries right now.

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2-for-1 broke-it-and-paid-for-it trip, awesome. #EJDTD

What, no zip line?

Thanks for the great topic @angelatague.bsky.social and I appreciate the insights from all.

The grinding has moved on past my driveway and the neighbor across the street so the afternoon might be a couple decibels quieter!

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So, for FHF ... I ran across this on LinkedIn recently, and I've never been to a AA meeting but the sentiment really resonated with me. #FreelanceFriends

Oh, the "I know what I don't want when I see it" guys are awesome.

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Correct. It justifies my rate for sure. And most of the time it works, except where the client's thing is in flux and they haven't figured out their marketing completely yet. But, nobody, not even them, can hit that target on the first try.

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Welcome to my world. I rarely get a creative brief, but I do get massive data dumps and an opportunity to interview SMEs and shape those into an outline or right to a draft depending on complexity.

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One piece but a lot of vendors/applications mentioned, it's a trends roundup. No budget for me to do *hours* of interviewing and I'm coming in cold in most cases.

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And he'd be correct.

Is it just me, or is the AI-slop writing pendulum swinging just a bit back toward our side in recent months?

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Open question for folks: do you have an efficient process for mass sourcing original quotes - like maybe 6 to 10 for an article, and not creating and sitting through long interviews? Short email, 3 Qs? Or a very short interview?

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A2: I do select a topic with a client and pitch their article to a magazine. ONE PAGE. Intro text and some bullets. Not an outline but the gist of an article. And never, ever do bait and switch (you can change a bullet or two).

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... and we're not going anywhere for a few hours, couldn't get out of the driveway if we tried with about a two-foot trench (they do backfill at the end of every day)

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A1a: and I prefer to get topic assignments from outlets, since those are usually coordinated with a calendar and advertising. I'm not very good at vamping off the top of my head in a regular column!

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A1: rarely do I pitch a specific content idea, but sometimes I will pitch a strategy, especially if there isn't an obvious one the client is using. Use that carefully, though, sometimes clients will take that and run with it, but leave you as the freelancer out.

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Was quiet for a few minutes, they just restarted this gigundous trencher across the street. Water is surprisingly on right now. They've been very methodical.

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HI, I'M DON, AND YOU'RE LOOKING LIVE AT WATER MAIN REPLACEMENT ON OUR STREET IN FRONT OF OUR HOUSE. SORRY, WHAT'S THAT? PLEASE SPEAK UP, THEY'VE BEEN GRINDING THIS ROCK ALL MORNING. #FREELANCEFRIENDS

Just occurred to me this is the same as the GOP gun violence strategy - allow (or provoke) a sh**ting or war, then go in and "stop" it, and the human costs don't matter, because we "stopped" it and it would be worse if we didn't. No lives matter, except for a select few elites.

"Little Bit" - Larkin Poe
"Rock N Roll Band" - The Dirty Nil

Need to see the arm, but for me, Konnor Griffin is emitting Troy Tulowitzki 2007 vibes. Same team transformation potential.

Sorry, gotta bail, TWO clients are providing conflicting edits to a case study, it's getting nuts, live discussion coming up at the bottom of the hour. Good seeing everyone today! #FreelanceFriends