Filed under: TUAW Business
We're feeling the love: Blogger application deadline is tonight
We asked, and you answered. Over 150 of you have already sent in your applications to join the TUAW team, and we're happily plowing through the entries now. It's been a real delight to see the enthusiasm and geek cred of everyone who has turned in sample posts... while a few of you might have benefited from additional proofreading of your submissions before hitting 'send' (ahem), the overall level of quality and insight is quite amazing.
Amazing, and also very daunting -- since we can't take all of you, the process of winnowing this bushelful of excellence down to a few candidates is going to involve a lot of hard choices, grim faces and possibly some yelling. We're heading into our undisclosed location this weekend equipped with all the latest decision support technologies and we hope to have answers for all of you soon.
The deadline for applications is midnight ET tonight, Friday 11/7. See the original recruitment post for details. We do have far, far more qualified applicants than we have slots for contributors, so please don't be discouraged if we can't tap you on the shoulder this round.
Get a WordPress.com Blog
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Mat Venne said 1:52PM on 11-07-2008
Good luck to everyone who entered :)
Reply
Squid7085 said 2:11PM on 11-07-2008
I was going to give it a shot, but, I don't know if I would have the time. Maybe next time. :-)
Reply
Ed said 3:26PM on 11-07-2008
Oh come on - "a few of you might have benefited from additional proofreading of your submissions before hitting 'send' (ahem)". I don't think TUAW is in a position to criticize anyone for a lack of proofreading. Glasses houses and all that...
Reply
Michael Rose said 3:54PM on 11-07-2008
So you're saying we should hire people who aspire to our current level of grammatical perfection? Or those who strive for greatness?
Ed said 5:08PM on 11-07-2008
What I am saying was perfectly clear in my original comment - don't put words in my mouth please. If you want to make a point, make it yourself, instead of deliberately misrepresenting mine.
Brian Sexton said 5:56AM on 11-08-2008
Ed, I think you missed the point completely. If you want to hire someone to do a job, it doesn't matter what mistakes you might happen to makeonly that you hire the best candidates you can. Part of the hiring process is criticizing the work and apparent abilities of each candidate. In this case, a general criticism that seems likely to increase the quality of further submissions is completely appropriate.
Michael Rose said 9:32AM on 11-08-2008
Ed, no intent to misrepresent, just genuinely curious. As noted by Brian, we're trying to find the best people for the slots -- the lack of proofreading on a submission is a definite drawback. Whatever the state of the site's current proofreading standards, getting people with already-high standards can only help.
P.S. What is "Glasses houses and all that..."? I think the expression is "glass houses."
Ed said 1:37PM on 11-09-2008
Michael, you're either genuinely naive - which I don't believe for a minute - or you're deliberately choosing to miss my point to make your own, which is rude and poor debating. Then you've chosen to go for a cheap and pointless dig in your P.S. (and the faux-naif question again), which is unequivocally rude.
Phenix 05 said 4:04PM on 11-07-2008
apparently this person making this list has twins...
Reply
SpinThis! said 4:23PM on 11-07-2008
Hopefully these new writers will actually write their own content and commentary. A lot of what I see these days on TUAW is old news rehashed by others (Gruber, MacRumors, etc). How about some insightful commentary?
Those who didn't "make it" onto TUAW should really start their own blogs since TUAW will probably just link to it anyway. I hate to say it but this blog has started to become less and less relevant.
Reply
Jash Sayani said 2:37AM on 11-08-2008
Waiting for the results.....
Reply
sam said 3:43AM on 11-08-2008
I really was planning on applying for this. I really wanted to.
I ... I was distracted. There was this hot girl. Where I was at. I mean REALLY hot. So I stayed at the bar a little longer...past the deadline. (we were celebrating the opening of a show.)
Next time. Next time.
Reply
Joseph said 1:27AM on 11-09-2008
We will take your submission late if you got her number. If you didn't then you don't meet our standards.
Thank you
--The Management
Brian Sexton said 5:38AM on 11-08-2008
Over 150 applicants adds up to over 450 original pieces of writing (not counting introductions) that will likely never be published anywhere and thus, aside from writing practice, a tremendous amount of wasted time for quite a lot of people. I feel sorry for anyone who puts a considerable amount of valuable time and earnest effort into this, but is not selected.
It's too bad you won't look at extant writings, at least as a first stage of your search; that would allow busy people to show you the quality of their writing before committing potentially several hours of work to an application while such a large pool of applicants remains. You could narrow things down a bit first then require original writings only for a second stage of your search; that could save a lot of time for a lot of people and maybe even get you more qualified candidates (i.e., capable writers who are otherwise occupied at the time of your recruiting announcement, but would be happy to make time to write some original articles if pre-screened and part of a shallower pool).
Alas, I have been quite busy lately, so my new MacBook remains unreviewed and I have not applied, although I think it could be fun to write regularly for a blog like TUAW.
Reply
Michael Rose said 9:38AM on 11-08-2008
Hi Brian --
Your point about the effort is well taken, however you will note that unlike many other writing applications there is no "all submissions become the property of Weblogs, Inc." clause. Anyone not chosen is free to post their items elsewhere.
The original posts policy is Weblogs-wide and is in place to give us a sense of the unedited, raw capabilities of the potential blogger. Since TUAW posts are generally short, the effort should not be too burdensome.
If someone who is ideally qualified and already published widely were to contact us and say "is it worth me applying" we would offer an opinion... but that person would still have to do some original items for the process.
Dan Hughes said 12:11PM on 11-08-2008
As someone who applied, I don't find the exercise a waste of time at all. Like any other job you desire, there's amount of required effort that goes into it. For the people who don't get the gig, it does suck. But that's the case with any other opportunity in the professional world.
Brian Sexton said 1:14AM on 11-09-2008
It's a little different, Dan. Most potential employers don't ask all candidates to do a day of work for free before even being considered. And if you are being diligent in preparing at least one review, that one article of three could represent a day of work in itself.
OK, so who wants to start a site dedicated to publishing the best articles from the rejected authors? ;)
Michael Jones said 1:19AM on 11-09-2008
I agree with Dan. While you make a good point about the amount of effort involved, that extra effort is easily a point of impression on the TUAW staff. There are a lot of people out there who will say "yeah, sure, I can do that" and apply for the post, but how many of them would actually be willing to put in that extra effort to prove themselves?
I think the post requirement itself serves as a threshold, filtering out those who just say they want the position from those who are willing and able to work for it. I mean, if you can't dedicate a small amount of time to write up a few example posts, how does that demonstrate that your ability to regularly write posts and generate original content?
Besides, it's a good experience all around. Personally, I found it fun and rewarding. Yeah, maybe I'm just a nerd, but why else would I be reading this blog? ;-)
Joseph said 1:30AM on 11-09-2008
They wouldn't be wasted if they were posted for us to read and rate. After all we are the consumers of said product. Shouldn't we evaluate what we like to read? Perhaps you could even have brackets and do like 10-20 applicants at a time. It would be a fierce competition.
Let me know if you guys want to hire a creative director.
Brian Sexton said 8:52AM on 11-09-2008
Michael Jones, I see your point, but I don't think your comparison is quite valid because people will make and reserve time for formal employment regardless of whether they are inclined to spend significant amounts of time and effort competing against 150 or more other people for a single position with no pre-qualification.
Joseph, something like that could make things fun and at least all of the submissions would be published.