Getting Rich Slowly, Living on the Line
Posted on | July 29, 2010 | 2 Comments
By Jules Older
As journos, writers, editors and authors, we’re living on a fault line.
Jules Older
And journos, writers, editors and authors in San Francisco live on two fault lines. The famous one is the San Andreas Fault, which may bring the house down sometime soon.
The lesser-known one has already brought down many colleagues and friends.
This one’s a grinding shift of epochs, not of tectonic plates. We live on the divide between the Gutenberg Era and the Digital Age. The days of print may be done, and many friends who write or shoot for newspapers and magazines, who write or edit books, have lost their source of income.
Oh, and not just friends. I was editor-in-chief of two magazines, both victims of the shift. There went the income.
With the magazines gone and others going — I know this will shock you — assignments became rather scarce. As newspapers began folding along with magazines, former journalists and once-were-editors started competing with freelancers for rapidly shrinking editorial space.
You’ve heard that old Chinese curse, May you live in exciting times. If you’ve made your living in print, yer soaking in it.
The app: San Francisco Restaurants
I was soaking in it.
Then the phone rings. No, because we are now in Digi Times, an email arrives. It’s from Sutro Media, a couple of entrepreneurial San Francisco engineers who want to know if I’d like to create an iPhone app about San Francisco restaurants.
I don’t email back; I pick up the phone. “If I do, I want to do it my way.”
“Which is?”
“Which is the opposite of Yelp and Urban Spoon and all those.”
“Which means?”
“Which means not crowd-sourced — one man’s palate, one woman’s photos. Which means uncorrupted by influencing ads, by pay-to-play, by anonymity.”
“What have you got against anonymity?”
“A lot. Writing as “Foodfreak,” the owner proclaims how fabulous his restaurant is. Writing as “Truthseek,” his competitor down the block swears that it totally sucks and he got ptomaine poisoning last time he was there.”
“Anything else?”
“Matter of fact, yes. I want to take users to where San Franciscans eat, not just to the same old stops on the Tiki Tour. I want to get them off the Tourist Reservation. I want to introduce them to bargains, not money flushers. I want to name my favorites and to castigate the overpriced and the overhyped.”
Sutro says, “When do we start?”
I say, “We just did.”
Sutro says, “Oh, and who’s the woman?”
“That would be Effin Older, my wife, the photographer.”
The app, San Francisco Restaurants, went live on Thanksgiving. Now, it’s been through three expansions. It still costs 99 cents. Upgrades are still free. And it’s beginning to reach beyond the bridges to where visitors go on their big San Francisco trip.
Effin and I are eating out a lot. We each weigh just under 400 pounds. [Editor's note: Not; I've seen them.]
Ah, but am I getting rich, rich? Am I making anything like what I did when I was the editor-in-chief?
Hell no, not even close.
Do I care?
Hell, yes. But writers are used to get-rich-slow schemes. Especially when we’re living on a fault line.
– 30 –
Jules and Effin Older are the creators of a bunch of kids’ books, a gaggle of YouTube videos (www.YouTube.com/julesolder) and the iPhone app, San Francisco Restaurants. Click here to buy the app. If you buy it, help a fellow journalist out and add a review of San Francisco Restaurants in iTunes.
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Welcome to Our Community
Is there life – or work – after newspapers? A lot of us are in the process of finding out. Because it’s generally a somewhat lonely endeavor, it struck me, in January 2010, that it might be comforting – and possibly very productive – to go through it together.
Displaced Journalists is a community – our community – where we find common ground, where we can begin to pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and get on with our lives and livelihoods. [more]
August 3rd, 2010 @ 8:32 PM
EXCELLENT. I love the “terms” you established: Here’s the list of stuff I won’t do. A substantial drop in work and/or income should not mean a substantial drop in ethics …
August 4th, 2010 @ 12:29 AM
Amen, Kelly.