Fun for Freelancers: Getting Stiffed
One of my favorite scams is the one employed by a guy who’s putting together a book and wants to see a sample chapter from prospective writers (who were stupid enough to respond to his ad). Say he’s planning a 10-chapter book and gets 100 responses from free-lancers wanting to try out for the project. He divides the respondents into groups of ten and has each group submit a different “sample” chapter. Then he has 10 samples to choose from for each chapter and all he needs to do is pick the best one for each chapter and — presto! — he’s got a book. Then he tells all 100 writers that their samples didn’t work out and stiffs them all.
