Off The Wire: News for the Canadian media freelancer April 23-29

Once a week, we gather stories about the media business, journalism, writing, publishing, and freelancing—with a Canadian focus—and share them in Off the Wire. Who needs a water cooler?

From Canada:

• Toronto Star union comes back with offer [Steve Ladurantaye]
• How to effectively interview sources [Networds] (via @jaclynlaw)
• Vancouver Sun, the Province offering employee buyouts [Globe and Mail]
• All the news an advertiser can pay for [Globe and Mail]
• Don’t put blame of the problems of the newspaper industry on reporters and editors [J-Source]
• Why being a news reporter is NOT the worst job in the world [J-Source]
• Montreal’s community weeklies must make do without journalists [Fagstein]
• CJF announces finalists for Excellence in Journalism Award [J-Source]
• The emergence of the market for data-journalism skills [J-Source]
• Fox News anchor: Canada “not great at the television” [J-Source]
• Globe and Mail announces voluntary separation program for staff [Globe and Mail]
• Born in adversity, Jewish paper succumbs to the Internet [Globe and Mail] (via @sladurantaye)

From the U.S. and beyond:

• The Pro’s Guide to Working Remotely [Mashable]
• Advice for Aspiring Children’s Book Authors [GalleyCat] (via @mediabistro)
• How the L.A. Times can stop the Kochs [Washington Post] (via @jayrosen_nyu)
• Really Annoying Things People Say to Freelance Writers [Freelance Strategist] (via @contently)
• How to: ride out the freelancing rollercoaster [Journalism.co.uk]
  
• Self-Publishing Is For Control Freaks [Forbes] (via @mediabistro)
• IFJ/EFJ Call for Global Fight Back Against Unfair Contracts [IFJ] (via @paythewriter)
• Newspaper reporter is worst job in 2013, study says [Poynter]

From Story Board last week:

• The Born Freelance on the Care and Ethical Treatment of Interviewees, Part 2: In my last post, I wrote about caring for and ethically treating one of our most important freelance career assets, interviewees. In this post I would like to add a few more thoughts to the discussion…
• Content farms and the decline of long form: Want to get hits on your website? Easy. Just feature a list. “Here are the Best Dumb Things Ryan Lochte Said on His Reality Show,” or “10 Reasons Duke the Corgi Has the Potential To Be One of America’s Next Top Corgis” are actual articles you can find on the sites Gawker and BuzzFeed, respectively, right now…

Spot a story you think we should include in next week’s Off the Wire? Email the link to editor@thestoryboard.ca or tweet us at @storyboard_ca.