Archive

Hi there,

Earlier this week, a journalist asked me a few questions about getting into comedy during this bizarre year (hopefully my words will make it into a piece this weekend), and that made me realise that a lot of the set I’m delivering at the Funny Women Stage Awards semi-final tonight is about wanting to explain this unique time in our lives to my two-year-old niece when she’s grown up.

It’s so odd to think that a show like will seem quaint to her, in the way that does do to me (okay, maybe not the 1982 ).

Hi there,

It feels like a new beginning is round the corner, right? We’re on some kind of strange summer holiday now (and I will be too, for a long weekend, from this afternoon!), but that back-to-school feeling never fails to strike when September starts to appear on the horizon.

Hello hello,

Hi there,

I’ve changed the newsletter’s name, to the name of the first blog I ever had: To Strive, To Seek, To Find (which has now been folded into my website, and I’m not sure what to with it right now - anyone out there still blogging?).

Hi there,

Welcome to new subscribers, there’s been a flurry of you recently! Happy to be writing to you on this beautiful and soon-to-be-boiling-hot day in London. If you’d like to say hi, just reply to this email - I love hearing from you!

In this issue, there’s a summary of the latest podcast episode with Mic Wright, a global letter from lockdown from South Africa, a rundown on what I’ve been doing and my online masterclasses, plus things on the internet I’ve been enjoying. Let’s dive in…

Hi there,

What an exciting week: Freelance Pod hit 10,000 downloads!

Hi there,

So I’m running a masterclass on using personal essays to break into a new publication or niche on Tuesday 4th August, from 6:30-8pm, over Zoom.

Hi there,

What a grey rainy hell-week it’s been in London! And it’s not quite over yet! Hope this missive is a little ray of sunshine for you.

The latest guest on the podcast is journalism professor at The American University of Cairo, Kim Fox.

Hello there,

In this edition of the newsletter, there’s an answer to the question in the subject line, a global letter from lockdown in Cairo, Egypt and a tweet that sums up my feelings on Glastonbury.

Writer and comedian Alex Bertulis-Fernandes guests on the latest episode of Freelance Pod, telling me about the time her artwork when viral on Twitter, how writing for stand-up has improved her other writing and why vulnerability in a writer is so important.

Hi there,

Here’s a little something to read while you enjoy the easing of lockdown. Hope you’re looking forward to the easing of lockdown, when apparently we’ll just have to keep one metre apart at all times, instead of two - if you’re having trouble doing that, just imagine 1.5 fridges between you.

Hi there,

I’ll avoid starting off this newsletter on the wrong foot…

Hi there,

While the acronym ‘BAME’ has become has become the standard way to refer to non-white people in the UK, the umbrella term squashes together the very different experiences that Black and Brown people can face.

This week has not been a moment for BAME voices. It has been a moment for Black voices. Amplifying them is the aim of today’s newsletter.

Hi all,

I’ve endured a few wifi blackouts during the lockdown, including this morning. There’s a particular panic-inducing helplessness to losing your only connection to the outside world during a pandemic.

When it first happened in April, I decided that the only way to get through it was to become extremely zen about it: no one could reasonably expect work on a tight schedule from me right now, because we’re all trapped. There’s nowhere for me to take my laptop for better internet. Even if I’m isolated right now, surely we’re all in this together? At least I still had phone data so that I could explain the situation when needed.

Hi all,

It was lovely and kind of painful to see the retweets of Robyn Vinter’s tweet, asking for us to share the last picture from our normal lives. I honestly thought mine was from late March, but it can’t have been, as lockdown began on 23rd March, and I was becoming a bit anti-social before then.

Hi all,

Londoners, what’s happening with the weather? I can’t tell when to take my one-a-day walk. I don’t want to waste it getting soaked. Hm. Guess I’ve made writing this newsletter my extremely indoor activity for the afternoon.

Hi all,

I’ve decided to keep writing the newsletter while we remain on lockdown - we could all do with more content to consume, right?

Fifty years from now, people the age you are now won’t believe this ever happened; or will do this sort of eye-roll we all do when someone tells us about something crazy that happened in 1960. What will convince that future kid is what you’re able to write about this.

Hi all,

Freelance Pod has returned after a bit of a break! We’re on Season 2, Episode 40 (I like long seasons, apparently) and the podcast is now going monthly.

Should I stick to a weekly newsletter during the lockdown, though? If so, should I call it something else? Hmmm…

Hi all,

It’s a sunny Christmas Eve and I’m wrapping presents while listening to a 100% Xmas tunes playlist. Here is a gigantic picture of me as a reindeer, so that this newsletter has a social image.

Hello there,

Well, would you look at that, I‘ve been making this little podcast for a whole darn year now! That was my main aim when I started: to produce a podcast for a year, and see what happened. I made that my aim because I’d had to leave behind my first podcast at my old job, after only six months of working on it. I was still fizzing with ideas and wanting to learn more about making audio.

Hi there,

You get to hear from Standard Issue Podcast on the latest episode of Freelance Pod! So let’s forget about the actual news and take a little walk down memory lane to the neon-lit Soho of the last century, via 90s lads’ mags, shall we…?

Hi all,

The science writer - and soon-to-be-author of Smoke & Mirrors: How Hype Obscures the Future and How to See Past It* - will be joining me onstage as my guest for ’s live recording at the , Soho in November!

Hi there,

The latest episode of Freelance Pod was recorded in front of a live audience at the London Podcast Festival in September 2019. joined me onstage to guide us through his forced journey from Aleppo, Syria to London, and what’s happened in the six years since. As his own upcoming podcast aims to show, a refugee’s story doesn’t end when they get leave to remain in a safe place - but a new story of integration does begin.

Hi all,

A quick midweek missive to let you know that Freelance Pod has been shortlisted for an award!

celebrate the best of the European internet, and they’re also a spin-off of , so it’s an incredible honour to be recognised by them. I’m utterly thrilled to even appear on the page for the .

Hi everyone,

We did it! Freelance Pod went live at the London Podcast Festival on Saturday!

Hi everyone!

T-3 days until live recording!!

I regret to inform you that there are now stickers:

Beth Ashton, The Telegraph's head of social media, kindly invited me over to their offices to tell me about how they do... social media. Traditionally, The Tele's newspaper readers have been amongst the oldest in the UK, which should present a challenge to converting them into online readers. They've also got a metered paywall and Premium content that stops quick and easy reads or sharing.

Nevertheless, as Beth tells us, The Tele is one of the few news websites to make Snapchat work, and to harness the power of social media to bring in newer, younger readers. Going niche is good, and allows for a different tone - compare the Telegraph's feed to , for example. Their columnists and their podcasts also present unique content that convince readers to subscribe.

Hi all,

Hope you’re enjoying the gorgeous bank holiday sunshine - it’s already 28 degrees C out there!

With the London Podcast Festival only weeks away, I’ve been sticking to a podcast theme on Freelance Pod. This week, it’s the host of Podcast Radio Hour on BBC Radio 4 Extra, ! Freelance Pod was back in April.

BBC Radio 4 Extra's Podcast Radio Happy Hour has become another way to discover great podcasts, as well as an opportunity for some lucky podcasters to get heard on the radio.

Host and producer Amanda Litherland came up with the idea a few years ago, and found herself thrown in front of the microphone. Luckily, her comedy background has helped her presenting, although she is open about only practice can give you interviewing skills - and the confidence to ask those questions.

On this episode, we delve into what makes podcasts different to radio, why comedians and podcasts go together and the Eddie Mair advice that helps her show.

Hi everyone,

I’ve been having the busiest August of my life. How is it the 21st already?!

However hectic my month is, though, it’s not a patch on that of my latest guest Zoë Jeyes, for sure.

Here it is, the Freelance Pod guide to the London Podcast Festival 2019, with programmer Zoë Jeyes!

Zoë is Deputy MD and Comedy Programmer at , and has been working there since it opened 11 years ago. A longtime podcast fan, she first floated the idea of a festival in 2014, with the first one going ahead in 2016.

Hi all,

It was a delight to speak to Jackie Annesley about her career in newspapers and her pivot to tech, as Creative Director of Soda Says.

"I loved being a journalist," writes Jackie Annesley in a frank essay about losing her last job in journalism, as editor of The Sunday Times Style supplement, where, among many other things, she commissioned the PanDolly podcast from two of her columnists; it's now better known by its second name, The High Low, with journalists Pandora Sykes and .

Hi all,

It’s too hot outside, politics is the worst and yeah… if now’s not the time to queue up 239 podcast episodes on your phone, when is?

For something soothing, try this podcast that’s just birdsong (found via ).

Matt Cooke is Head of Partnerships & Training, Google News Lab, part of the Google News Initiative.

has been a major factor in completely changing how news is indexed, distributed, discovered and consumed. That's because the internet has changed news distribution to include you, the reader, the audience, yes you, you control what you want to see, when you want to see it. Alongside sharing and self-publishing on social media, Google indexing news has completely changed the industry.

Hello!

Firstly - I’ve moved over to Substack, thanks to a well-timed tweet from Anna Codrea-Rado, aka The Professional Freelancer. The new sign-up url is if you’d like to pass it on.

Did you know that there's a Freelance Pod live event at the London Podcast Festival in September? Yup, alongside big hitters like The Guilty Feminist, Have You Heard George's Podcast and The Allusionist, Freelance Pod is going to have its first live event, and you can be part of the audience! Click this link for more information, and to buy tickets for under a tenner.

Journalist, author and founder of the soon-to-be-launched Freelance Feels, Jenny Stallard joins me on the podcast to talk about her career moving from print to digital, her freelancing journey and why freelancers need to more vigilant about our mental wellbeing than the more traditionally employed. I've written here about how freelancing got me down, and how this podcast solved it! Love U, Freelance Pod!

Deez Links is "a dailyish link to cool shit happening in & around the media industry." Each day, Delia Cai - also Growth & Trends Editor at Buzzfeed - sends out one link. Just one link. She really sells it, in the way you'd want a particularly well-informed and fun friend to sell it to you. It's working out for her - Deez Links turned three in February, and was recently voted fourth most popular media newsletter, after Nieman Lab, Axios and American Press Institute.

Delia guests on the podcast to talk about how she wanted to take the quick wit of a Snapchat streak and turn that into a newsletter; how extra her third birthday celebrations for Deez Links were, but the community she built loved meeting in IRL, so actually, it was just enough; and the joy of having a passion project.

We've got a new season of Black Mirror on Netflix, so here are Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones to talk us through Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too, Smithereens and Striking Vipers. They also take the piss out of each other and make me LOL.

Don't worry, there aren't any spoilers, so you're safe to listen before watching the season. It is, however, extremely sweary right from the start.

Along the way, there are bits on Newswipe and Screenwipe, a blast from the past of the Unnovations Catalogue (!) and some insight into Andrew Scott aka Moriarty, aka Fleabag's Hot Priest and the ranting character he plays in the episode Smithereens.

Season 5 episodes discussed: Striking Vipers; Smithereens; Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too.

This episode for Mental Health Awareness Week in the UK features Dr Samara Linton, and will be out later today. She tells me about putting together The Colour of Madness, the book that she co-edited. It's about the black and minority ethnic experience of mental illness, mainly in the UK, the medical services around it and how racial stereotypes remain, grimly, a part of that process.

The book that takes a frank, clear-eyed look at how the failures of those services can lead to vulnerable people missing out on help, getting misdiagnosed or ending up in prison. It's a snapshot of this moment in time, when we're more open than ever to talking about mental illness, but that conversation still marginalises certain groups.

It's part two of my interview with Twitter's Director of Curation, Joanna Geary. She takes us through her career from working at The Guardian to starting out at Twitter in 2013, with loads of great insight on how the journalism industry has tried and tried and tried again to mould itself to the demands of the internet.

Joanna's also got some great tips on taking your skills out of the newsroom and into a tech company, if you're starting to look at other options.

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Substack is a platform for newsletters and podcasts. Find out more at . 

Joanna Geary started out as a print journalist in 2004 - as a business reporter on the Birmingham Post - and ended up in charge of Twitter's Curation team in 2017. That's a job and a company that didn't exist when she started her career.

From blogging in Birmingham and using Facebook to find people on the scene of the , to setting up in London, via ' paywall and 's social strategy, Joanna tells me how her career has been shaped by working at the intersection of news and digital.

Every freelancer I've interviewed for this podcast - or just met in the past 11.5 months of freelancing - has worn multiple work hats. It's just the way of things, as freelance consumer journalism is very unlikely to pay the bills to live in a major western city in 2019 AD.

Talk to freelancers making decent money from content marketing, and they'll most likely mention Contently. Founded in 2011, the platform works with brands to find them storytellers.

, , joins me on this episode to talk about how to start a portfolio to appeal to brands, what her team is looking for in your past clippings and bylines to match you to brands and how content marketing differs from journalism in some important ways.

If you're a keen podcast listener, you might recognise Caroline's name from the Hot Pod newsletter, or, since yesterday, from The Browser's daily inbox offering. Sign up for The Listener here:

Bonus mini-episode!

Freelance Pod was featured on BBC Radio 4 Extra's Podcast Radio Hour! Host Amanda Litherland and guest Renay Richardson listened to a clip from the third episode of the podcast, Music sounds better with you, feat. BBC 6 Music producer Shola Aleje. They went on to discuss Shola's advice on making a podcast, freelancing and self-care.

Two years ago, audio producer Lewis Raven Wallace was fired from his job at Marketplace, a radio programme made by American Public Media.

He had refused to take down a blogpost he had written in response to Donald Trump's recent inauguration, . As a member of a marginalised group - Lewis is trans - he delves into the myth of 'journalistic objectivity', which is central to American journalism.

This episode's guest is writer, coach and podcaster Rebecca L. Weber.

Born and raised in Boston, Rebecca takes us along on her journey from the US to South Africa, and from teaching to journalism to teaching writers to build freelance businesses, and coaching those new to writing on their way to becoming freelancers.

Like many freelance writers, Rebecca wrote a newsletter, but it only really started making sense when she converted it into The Writing Coach Podcast. Through podcasting, she gets more feedback from those needing her coaching, and she can form a clearer idea of which issues need to be addressed right now, as freelancers learn to adapt to the ever-changing digital world.

As a fellow digital comms trainer, I'm with Rebecca - us freelancers have to stay open to continual training.