Translation guide for comments from copywriters

Translation guide for comments from copywriters

Copywriters can be hard to read. What you’re explaining your idea and they make a remark, what do they actually mean? Here’s a handy translation guide. “Tell me more.” That made absolutely no sense. “Whoa, that confused me a little bit.” Using that many jargon words in a sentence should be illegal. [Blank stare.] I’m…

Questions to ask as you start a freelance business
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Questions to ask as you start a freelance business

My friend Merlina McGovern — the smartest copy editor I’ve ever worked with — got laid off from my old company last month. After 16 years working for Forrester, she’s starting a business as a freelancer. She had questions, so we talked. Since any freelancer starting a business might have similar questions, let’s walk through…

The lesson of author Bethany Mandel: don’t go on camera unless you’re prepared — and don’t make excuses afterwards
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The lesson of author Bethany Mandel: don’t go on camera unless you’re prepared — and don’t make excuses afterwards

If you’re going to wade into controversial public discourse, you’d better be prepared for the controversy. Otherwise, you could end up like Bethany Mandel, the author who humiliated herself on video, then made things worse by writing a vacuous essay about how bad it felt. Bethany Mandel is the coauthor of Stolen Youth: How Radicals…

What if paid subscriptions didn’t automatically renew?
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What if paid subscriptions didn’t automatically renew?

As a consumer, you probably subscribe to a lot of ongoing (monthly or yearly) services. If regulations required you to proactively renew them, we’d wash a lot of stupid, poor corporate behavior out of the system. Should this be the law? Let’s explore what it might mean. What do you subscribe to? What do you…

The dishonesty of The Dawn Project’s anti-Tesla Super Bowl ad
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The dishonesty of The Dawn Project’s anti-Tesla Super Bowl ad

An advocacy group called “The Dawn Project” aired an ad challenging the safety of Tesla’s Full Self Driving feature during the Super Bowl. The ad is a good example of dishonest fearmongering. Before I analyze the ad, let me clarify two things. First, this ad appeared, not nationally, but in local markets like Washington, DC…