Guest Blogging at LitFest: Get Paid

My first guest post at LitFest Magazine is up and running, with some very basic advice for writers: get paid. Here's the intro:

I just ran across a reminder of a valuable lesson for writers. From Arianna Huffington, believe it or not.

Huffington, best known for losing the race for California governor to Arnold Schwarzenegger, recently sold her website to AOL for $315 million.

Many of the people blogging for free on her site have since gone on strike. If the site is worth a few hundred million, they figure they ought to get paid. Her response?  Nobody will care. "Go ahead, go on strike," she said.

This shows us two things.

1) Arianna Huffington is kind of a d-bag.

2) If you're going to write, God damn it, don't give it away for free.

You can hear the same advice, in much more entertaining form, from Harlan Ellison, whom I quote in the post as well:

My thanks again to Amanda Goossen for inviting me.