America's Newest Profession: Bloggers for Hire

当今美国，靠写博客为生的人几乎跟律师一样多。通过将自己的观点贴在网上来获得主要收入的美国人已经多过电脑程序员或是消防队员了。收费博客作者几乎符合“微趋势”的所有定义：过去几年中，他们的人数迅猛增长；写博客已经成了一种重大的社会文化运动，人们对之热情高涨；而靠写博客赚钱的人占美国成年人口的比例已接近1%。我们所能找到的最好的研究显示，美国博客作者总人数超过2,000万，其中170万人从中营利，而45.2万人以博客写作为主要收入来源。将近200万人通过设置关键词发贴或是点击量得到报酬－－无论是他们自己网站的点击量还是去点击别人的网站。也就是说，像鲍勃•迪伦(Bob Dylan)在歌曲《卡特飓风》(Hurricane Carter)里唱的那样，将近50万人都可以说，这是我的工作，我干这个就是为了挣钱。Getty Images这种情况可能让我们成了全世界最吵闹最固执己见的国家。信息时代催生了许多新职业，但博客写作很可能会是对我们的文化影响最深远的。如果说新闻记者是第四等级（新闻界的别称），那博客作者正成为第五等级。博客最开始只是一个讨论革新政见和新技术的论坛，现在内容已经广泛涉及育儿医疗卫生艺术时尚牙科……几乎囊括你能想到的所有生活领域。写博客最初只是一项自愿自发的业余爱好和宣泄渠道，现在却成了一个重大的商机，对于新兴网站依赖博客作者观点的公司以及从事这个新兴行业的人而言莫不如此。从人口统计学的角度看，博客作者的受教育程度极高：四分之三的人为大学毕业。绝大多数为白人男性，收入高于平均水平。三分之一的年轻人说自己写博客，但成功地以此谋生的博客作者仅占2%。每月唯一访问者达到10万左右才能实现年收入7.5万美元。一篇好的博客文章报酬可能在75美元至200美元之间，有的博客作者还充当“代言博客”－－广告商付费让他们为产品撰写博客文章。由于这样的工作完全不需要上下班通勤，因此写博客没准是世上最环保的工作了－－同时也可能带来丰厚的收入。顶级博客站点的收益相当高。在某种程度上，博客网站Huffington Post 的价值无疑超过《华盛顿邮报》(Washington Post)。这份工作的门槛极低。大多数靠博客挣钱的写手付费80美元开个博客，从事博客写作的时间大约在35个月左右，可赚回几百美元。但有一小群博客作者是真正专门从事博客写作的，他们在公司供职，担任薪资丰厚的博客顾问，或是为访问量很大的网站写东西。在公司任职的专职博客作者通常年收入4.5万-9万美元。有1%的人年收入在20万美元以上。这些人的写作时间也很长，达到每周50-60小时。写博客的人越来越多，而同时新闻记者的人数却显著下滑。仅华盛顿一地，大报社驻华盛顿的雇员人数现在就比几年前减少了79%。与此同时，华盛顿也轻松地成为了美国最受博客作者关注的城市，如果说不上世界范围的话。几乎没有博客是通过订阅营利的；其经济发展模式是依靠在线广告。如果读者点击网站上的广告，博客作者就能挣钱。一些网站甚至还以点击量作为向作者付费的标准，这样一个体系当然会促使人们追求轰动效应，或是尽一切努力引起读者关注。很难想到还有什么工作会如此迅速地发展，并在没有任何考试学位，或是任何监管的前提下成为一支重大的社会力量。现在出现了一大堆有关博客写作的课程，也许要不了多久就会有哥伦比亚博客学院(Columbia School of Bloggerism)了。现在很多人都对使用Twitter和Facebook上网写东西以及交友很感兴趣，但这些平台无法提供博客写作这样的职业机会。自从eBay创立以来，还从没有这么多人都可以坐在电脑屏幕前赚钱，甚至是以此谋生。现在，有数百万人工投入在了写作和记录观点上，在这样的情况下，我们得考虑成为世界博客之都是否有助于美国在全球经济中的竞争。或许所有这些自我批评会让我们走上正确的道路，帮助我们选择正确的产品，从而推动我们前进。或许它会带来写作艺术和写作课程的复兴。抑或为危机中失业的专业人士充当安全网。但正在逐渐取代整个新闻记者队伍的近50万博客作者，他们没有劳动者保护，没有强制的道德规范，水平也有限，而且绝大多数都没有接受过正式的训练，这些人能撑多久？要知道，就连所谓的“狂野西部”最终也会褪色成“西部”而已。Mark Penn / E. Kinney Zalesne相关阅读原声视频：自主创业者该如何分配个人收入(中文字幕) 2009-04-21失业银行家如何开源节流 2009-03-16莫让工作压力伤及无辜 2009-03-10为求职做美容手术值得吗？ 2009-03-03求职面试中的“弱点”问题 2009-02-12


In America today, there are almost as many people making their living as bloggers as there are lawyers. Already more Americans are making their primary income from posting their opinions than Americans working as computer programmers or firefighters.Paid bloggers fit just about every definition of a microtrend: Their ranks have grown dramatically over the years, blogging is an important social and cultural movement that people care passionately about, and the number of people doing it for at least some income is approaching 1% of American adults.The best studies we can find say we are a nation of over 20 million bloggers, with 1.7 million profiting from the work, and 452,000 of those using blogging as their primary source of income. That's almost 2 million Americans getting paid by the word, the post, or the click -- whether on their site or someone else's. And that's nearly half a million of whom it can be said, as Bob Dylan did of Hurricane Carter: 'It's my work he'd say, I do it for pay.'This could make us the most noisily opinionated nation on earth. The Information Age has spawned many new professions, but blogging could well be the one with the most profound effect on our culture. If journalists were the Fourth Estate, bloggers are becoming the Fifth Estate.What started as a discussion forum for progressive politics and new technologies has now been applied to motherhood, health care, the arts, fashion, dentistry -- and just about every other imaginable area of life. What started as a hobby and an outlet for volunteers is becoming big business for newly emerging sites, for companies that now depend upon their reviews and for the people who work in this new industry.Demographically, bloggers are extremely well educated: three out of every four are college graduates. Most are white males reporting above-average incomes. One out of three young people reports blogging, but bloggers who do it for a living successfully are 2% of bloggers overall. It takes about 100,000 unique visitors a month to generate an income of $75,000 a year. Bloggers can get $75 to $200 for a good post, and some even serve as 'spokesbloggers' -- paid by advertisers to blog about products. As a job with zero commuting, blogging could be one of the most environmentally friendly jobs around -- but it can also be quite profitable. For sites at the top, the returns can be substantial. At some point the value of the Huffington Post will no doubt pass the value of the Washington Post.The barriers to entry couldn't be lower. Most bloggers for hire pay $80 to get started, do it for about 35 months, and make a few hundred dollars. But a subgroup of these bloggers are the true professionals who work at corporations, serve as highly paid blogging consultants or write for sites with substantial traffic.Pros who work for companies are typically paid $45,000 to $90,000 a year for their blogging. One percent make over $200,000. And they report long hours -- 50 to 60 hours a week.As bloggers have increased in numbers, the number of journalists has significantly declined. In Washington alone, there are now 79% fewer DC-based employees of major newspapers than there were just few years ago. At the same time, Washington is easily the most blogged-about city in America, if not the world.Almost no blogging is by subscription; rather, it owes it economic model to on-line advertising. Bloggers make money if their consumers click the ads on their sites. Some sites even pay writers by the click, which is of course a system that promotes sensationalism, or doing whatever it takes to get noticed.It is hard to think of another job category that has grown so quickly and become such a force in society without having any tests, degrees, or regulation of virtually any kind. Courses on blogging are now cropping up, and we can't be far away from the Columbia School of Bloggerism. There is a lot of interest now in Twittering and Facebooking -- but those venues don't offer the career opportunities of blogging. Not since eBay opened its doors have so many been able to sit at their computer screens and make some money, or even make a whole living.And with millions of human-hours now going into writing and recording opinion, we have to wonder whether being the blogging capital of the world will help America compete in the global economy. Maybe all this self-criticism will propel us forward by putting us on the right track and helping us choose the right products. Maybe it will create a resurgence in the art of writing and writing courses. Or serve as a safety net for out of work professionals in the crisis. But for how long can nearly 500,000 people who are gradually replacing whole swaths of journalists survive with no worker protections, no enforced ethics codes, limited standards, and, for most , no formal training? Even the 'Wild West' eventually became just the 'West.'Mark Penn / E. Kinney Zalesne