Class is in Session

November 24, 2003, 4:06 p.m.
In the past month I’ve written dozens of articles, sent out a handful of queries, chased down interview sources, sipped tea with other writers and learned a few important lessons. Because I was taught that it’s nice to share, I wanted to pass my recently acquired pearls of wisdom on to you.

Lesson One: It is entirely possible to write nine articles from start to finish in one week without sacrificing food, sleep or a daytime TV addiction.

I was skeptical at first, telling myself that the only way I could possibly meet nine deadlines (which, incidentally, all fell on the same day) was to work through the night, stopping only to refill my Diet Coke and take short bathroom breaks. I believed I would have to subsist on granola bars and cookies – and anything else my husband could throw at me while I holed up in my office.

But I claimed victory last week when I completed, and submitted all nine assignments. Not only is it possible, truth be told, it wasn’t all that difficult. Not only did I manage to eat three regular meals (and several tasty snacks) every day, I also had time to take a shower, check the mail and catch 8 hours of sleep a night – I even managed to sneak in an episode of Dr. Phil.

Lesson Two: Mean people do exist.

I had the unfortunate experience of having a writer steal my work. This person, who shall remain nameless, didn’t steal an article, or my identity, or my byline; they stole something far more precious – my ideas. And the worst part? This person doesn’t seem to think they’ve done anything wrong!

OK, so maybe no idea is truly original – even I confess to taking an idea from a local publication and turning it into a national assignment – but I would never, ever start pitching an idea that I knew another colleague had already written about and was still actively pitching. And I certainly wouldn’t say, “hey, you know the article you wrote about (insert very obscure, specific topic here)? I’ve pitched it to (insert names of specific publications with strong interest in aforementioned topic).” That’s just wrong.

Lesson Three: When your work is on the Web, it’s fair game.

I recently read about a writer who had her identity, byline, several journal entries and personal essays stolen by another writer. My first thought was, “who would be dumb enough to steal someone’s work/life and reprint them VERBATIUM?” But apparently, someone was.

“Imitation is the highest form of flattery,” so the saying goes, but doesn’t anyone remember their 10th grade English class? Plagiarism is illegal.

It was a slap-in-the-face reminder that putting copyrighted work in a public domain like the Internet doesn’t necessarily protect your work. Over the past several months I’ve had several of my articles reproduced on other web sites. Not only wasn’t I paid for my contributions, I wasn’t even asked for permission to reprint my original work. Apparently it’s perfectly legal if the web site that posts the article lists the original publication as the source.

My advice: Google your name and make sure that the publications and web sites where your work appears are supposed to be posting your words. If not, seek compensation. It is NOT okay to reproduce someone’s work without their permission.