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Live Citizen to Pay for Stories

Live Citizen, a citizen journalism site currently in beta testing, is offering $20 an article, according to its ad on JournalismJobs.com. The Los Angeles-based company wants journalists to sign up for 3-month contracts, which require 2 to 6 stories each week AND a video broadcast lasting from 5 to 15 minutes each. Stories are expected to be more than 350 words.

It’s easy to see why Live Citizen is looking for more journalists. The newest story on Business & Tech was almost two weeks old at the time I wrote this post. The World and U.S. sections seem more current, but do not have a lot of depth.

Jobs of Note Writer for Environmental Group

The Environmental Defense Fund is looking for a writer who can deliver “complex scientific, economic, and policy ideas in clear, lively, and compelling prose,” to donor audiences, according to JournalismJobs.com. This job will include communications responsibilities as well.

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Social Media, Job Search Seminar

If you find social media frustrating – not to mention time consuming – I feel your pain. Perhaps Caron Golden’s seminar called Mastering Social Media for Employment Success can help?

The San Diego-based freelance writer is offering the event from 8:30 a.m. to noon at National University in San Diego on July 21.

Topics include:

• What employers are looking for in job applicants
• How to make over your resume to win you an interview and an offer
•  Why participating in social networks such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter is no longer optional for job seekers
• The differences and relationships between social media platforms and how to put them to work getting you working

The seminar costs $95 if you register before July 13th.

Jobs of Note Anti-Defamation League Needs Producer

The Anti-Defamation League seeks a senior producer in New York, reports Media Bistro. The job entails research, writing, editing, proofreading and copyediting for online and email publications. Go here for further details.

Jobs of Note

A San Diego business website has posted an ad for Deputy Web Editor on JournalismJobs.com. Here is part of the job description posted by The Daily Transcript and San Diego Source:

The position involves originating, gathering and organizing appropriate regional and national content in various distribution channels including web, email, cell phone and print. Designing and creating graphic presentations and packages appropriate to our subscriber users.

The publications are owned by the Revelle-Scripps family. The San Diego Source is a subscription-based publication with more than 6.6 million visitors a year, according to the company’s website.

AOL Patch’s Things Up

I know, I know, hyper-local news doesn’t seem all that exciting. Then again, America Online just paid $10 million to buy hyper-local news site, Patch, and another $10 mill for Going, writes Kara Swisher in BoomTown.

I don’t know about you, but that kind of money sounds EXCITING to me. Not that I ever planned on getting rich, but in today’s economy I’ve been paying a wee bit more attention to that bottom line thing.

A couple months ago, I actually tried contacting Patch about whether they were going to make their software available to folks hoping to start local sites. I was one of more than 230 people who submitted inquiries, according to a press release in Swisher’s post. And now I know why I never heard back from them; they were probably too busy cooking up the sale!

Patch seems to be using journalists with professional experience, but I’m completely unclear about the company’s pay structure. It’s a shame Patch never responded to my earlier inquiry.

I am a bit surprised by the $10 million price tag. After all, there is not that much local advertising on the site. Of course it doesn’t hurt that Patch’s principal investor was AOL’s new CEO, Tim Armstrong. And since he’s heavily restructuring the beleaguered company, perhaps he has a plan in mind.

Here’s what Armstrong says in the AOL press release:

“Local remains one of the most disaggregated experiences on the Web today – there’s a lot of information out there but simply no way for consumers to find it quickly and easily. It’s a space that’s prime for innovation and an area where AOL has a significant audience and a valuable mapping service in MapQuest. Going forward, local will be a core area of focus and investment for AOL.”

The upshot? Maybe we should keep our eyes peeled for job opportunities at AOL soon.

Poynter Institute ProgramOffers Help With Career Search

Besides some guy sitting in his home office trying to provide help to out-of-work journalists, the big boys are also playing. This morning I received an email from the Poynter Institute offering a membership program designed to help media professionals find jobs.

The $100 fee includes a resume critique, half an hour of phone coaching and an online message board of media professionals to share job ideas and contacts. The Poynter Institute says the fee is to defray some of its costs.

The e-mail content is duplicated here on Colleen Barry Eddy’s blog.