[daear]

I'm a writer myself, and somehow I've managed to maintain a steady freelance career for 15+ years. This article hits uncomfortably close to home. The low pay, the uncertainty, the bending of your ethics to pay rent. There are upsides, of course, including the fact that I've been a remote worker for most of my adult life, but there are days when I have to convince myself the pros outweigh the cons.

The push towards clickbait makes it easier for gig writers to pick up work, while the lower cost of hiring them means publications can create more of it. Journalism does indeed suffer from this cycle, but how do we break it? I have a few ideas from my own time contributing to this monster, but implementing them isn't easy, nor guaranteed.

Like several in the comments, I tried the web dev route, learned to code, etc. It didn't take, it just wasn't satisfying, and I was competing with people who lived and breathed this stuff. Maybe if I had stuck with it for a few more years I would learn to like it, but I just felt like I was purposefully ignoring what I enjoyed.

I would love to toss my current mid-grade writing contracts and get back into real investigative journalism. Depth of reporting, of storytelling, is sorely needed. But doing that means dedicating more time than the gig economy allows. Hopping off the hamster wheel means falling ungraciously to the floor. Writing rarely provides a financial safety net.

I'm sure other industries suffer somewhat from the gig economy, and I'm sure they gain from it as well. I don't think it's going away, but we do need to find a way to save and promote quality as we fight for quantity.