Pros
- Helps laid off media professionals (editors & writers) keep our foot in the door of our field and keep using/maintaining our skills ("use it or lose it" definitely applies in copy editing). - Can work from home, library, coffeeshop, anywhere my laptop can get the internet - Can work as many or as few hours each day/week as I like - I like learning new things based on the variety of article topics I copy edit - Company has expanded over the years to provide copy for more websites and bigger-name websites, which makes me proud to say I edit for Demand - Company pays promptly 2x per week, and via PayPal, which makes it very simple. There have never been any errors in what I'm paid (I always get what I was supposed to get) - Occasionally on significant holiday weekends (Thanksgiving, Memorial Day, etc.) the company runs a sweepstakes where each article a writer submits, or each article a CE edits, earns entries into the sweeps, which is usually airline tickets or a cash amount. That's definitely a motivator and it also is a morale booster. (I haven't won yet but I will always keep trying!)
Cons
- The pay rate for both editors and writers is too low for what we're expected to do - Sometimes I get articles in my queue whose topics are not ones that I indicated on my preferences that I want to edit. I don't know why they show up - Whatever test or criteria the company uses to select writers is seriously flawed. I'm shocked at how often I encounter articles with embarrassing errors in very *basic* grammar, syntax, punctuation and AP Style. Do these writers not care, does Demand not care, or both? - We edit directly via a web interface/template on the Demand website & the site often has technical difficulties, especially on weekends when a lot of editors & writers want to work - Sending help requests to the help desk is frustrating because either they never respond, or they take a very long time to respond - Asking questions or airing concerns in the community forums on the website is not always helpful because often, the higher-ups who *should* answer the questions, don't answer, which leaves many of us feeling dissed and/or floundering - HIgher-ups rarely ever ask for input from editors & writers when making significant changes to the site, to the writing/editing process, to the style sheets, etc. Suddenly we are notified of some big change, and even if a bunch of us then comment (in the forums) that we don't like it for this or that reason, we are often ignored and nothing is addressed
