出版与作家生涯2015hopesandfears.com编辑精选
从布鲁克林到菲律宾：为内容农场写作是什么体验
What it's like to write for content farms, from Brooklyn to the Philippines
导读
这篇报道关注内容农场写手的处境，从布鲁克林到菲律宾；评论补充了按字数与关键词写 SEO 稿、外包、写作评级和平台接单的真实经验。对写作者来说，它提醒我们：当写作只为迎合算法和低价流量，质量和动力都会被消耗。
可以直接用的写作要点
- 01
先问写作是否提供真实价值；只为骗算法和凑关键词的稿子会迅速消耗热情。
- 02
商业写作也要守住可读性，关键词和长度要求应服务内容，而不是污染内容。
- 03
在内容市场接单时，写作评级和类型决定机会；尽量从低价比稿转向直接客户与长文、专业内容。
- 04
理解平台规则，但别把“被算法看见”当成唯一目标，人的判断仍是质量底线。
HN 评论精选
为 SEO 写垃圾稿短期能赚钱，但缺乏真实价值、极易倦怠；如今“骗”的多是人类算法，仍好过纯 spam。
我很久没干这行了（谢天谢地），但以前常写垃圾稿，用来支撑自己在中国各地流浪、逃避现实生活。500 词垃圾稿给 10 美元，主要为了 SEO。题材几乎什么都能写，但必须写得像样（没有语法错误），在非常具体的位置塞进一些关键词，并满足字数要求。后来我开始把写作外包给有英语学位的全职妈妈，以及一个会嗑药后一小时敲出三篇文章的朋友。表面看收入不错：写作对我来说很自然，很容易赚到每小时 30 美元，对坐在中国火车上的我算不错。但它最终会磨损你，尤其当你知道自己没提供任何真实价值、全部目的基本就是骗算法时，很快就会 burnout。现在仍不理想，但至少我们要骗的算法大多变成人了。我和别人一样讨厌 Buzzfeed 式标题党，但那仍比用无尽垃圾填满互联网好。
austenallred查看英文原文
I haven't done it in a long time (thank heavens), but I used to write a lot of garbage as a way to afford vagabonding around China and generally avoiding real life. I would get paid $10 for 500 words of utter garbage, mostly for SEO purposes. It could be about almost anything, it just had to be well-written (no grammar errors), include a smattering of keywords in very specific locations, and had to meet a length requirement. Eventually I started outsourcing my writing to stay-at-home moms with English degrees and one of my friends who would trip on acid and pound out three articles an hour. On the surface it was good money; writing comes naturally to me and I could easily make $30/hour, which was good money for someone sitting on a train in China. But eventually it starts to wear on you. Especially knowing that you're not providing any real value and your entire purpose is basically to trick an algorithm, it just burns you out very quickly. It's still not ideal for quality content, but at least now the algorithm we're all trying to trick is a mostly human one. I hate Buzzfeed clickbait as much as the next person, but it's still better than filling up the Internet with endless spam.
SEO 导向会让内容被关键词污染，而算法本身难以判断质量。
我觉得可悲的是，这么多内容是被 SEO——满足算法的欲望——驱动，而不是为了做出本身优质、可读的内容。为了登上 Google 首页，大量无用内容被制造出来，内容本身也被塞关键词污染。因为正如文章所说，Google 的算法分不清优质文章和劣质文章。
sparkzilla查看英文原文
I think it's sad that so much of this is driven by SEO -- a desire to satisfy an algorithm -- rather than to make good quality human readable content in its own right. In a desire to get on the front page of Google so much useless content is being created, and the content itself is tainted by the inclusion of keywords. This is because, as the article mentions, Google's algorithm can't tell a quality article from one that isn't.
内容市场分层明显：低价比稿与真实长文并存，直接建立客户关系更有利。
我不了解菲律宾那位写手的情况，不过今年早些时候，我在两份工作之间与一家内容供应商签约，处境和布鲁克林那位写手类似（不是文章里那家）。提交写作样本后，我得到一个写手等级（1—5，1 差到接不到活，5 完美）。等级影响你能接哪些公开任务：等级越高，任务越技术化、要求写得更好、篇幅更长。你可以在开放市场里挑任务，任务差异极大。有些公司明显是在为 SEO 诱饵建站，发布成千上万条 100 词小短文，每条主题不同，评级为 2，通常每条付 0.5 美元或更少。另一些公司真的想要博客文章，或改写公司网站上已有信息。写手常绕过市场，直接和客户建立关系；我在那里的短时间内，也有一小撮人接了 10 万到 30 万词的长文任务（技术手册、培训手册、文档等）。
sageabilly查看英文原文
I don't know about the writer in the Philippines, however I was in a similar situation as the writer in Brooklyn earlier this year when I signed on with a content provider while I was in between gigs (not the same one that the writer in the article works for). After submitting my initial writing sample, I was given a writer grade (from 1-5, with 1 being too horrible to get any work and 5 being perfect). Your writer grade influenced what open gigs you could accept- higher number gigs were more technical, wanted better writing, and were more long-form. You could pick from gigs in an open marketplace setting, and gigs varied wildly. Some companies were obviously trying to set up a website for SEO bait with gigs rated at a 2 posting for thousands and thousands of 100-word blurbs with a different topic per blurb, typically paying about $.50 or less per blurb. Other companies actually wanted content like blog posts or a re-write of info that's already on the company website. Frequently writers using the service would set up relationships with clients directly instead of going through the marketplace, and there was a handful in the short time I was there who accepted gigs writing 100K-300K long form pieces for companies (technical manuals, training manuals, documentation, etc.) While there are definitely content farmers utilizing writing services such as the one that I worked for and the one mentioned in the article, it can also be a great way to contract out content creation for new companies or getting someone to re-write and update existing content. It's a lot easier and cheaper to go through a writing company to get a copywriter for a temp gig than it is to go out and hire one, or even go to a regular temp agency since good writing is such a specialized skill.
一些“骗子”其实是转包项目的自由职业者，靠信息差赚钱。
最后那句引语最有意思：谈到干活却拿不到钱时，“很多这些‘骗子’其实是其他自由职业者，他们把自己的项目转包出去，好让自己不干活也能拿钱。”
AJ007查看英文原文
The final quote is the most interesting: In reference to not getting paid for job, "A lot of these 'scammers' are actually other freelancers who are delegating their own projects in order to get paid for it without having to do any of the work."
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