I've noticed over time that these journalistic rules often backfire when taken too far. It's like Hygiene, you need that value, but you take it too far and you end up alienated in your house breathing through a gas mask with sterilized oatmeal paste as your only ration, and that just becomes pointless, as the value is being exploited.

A lot of rules in film, journalism, and writing are great, but I see them treated as the ten commandments more or less than some thing that's more dynamic and fluid, and I believe that what survives in an ecosystem is the being that is capable of learning the basic rules (taught in the schools, but also learned online) and then can manipulate those rules, and combine them with more guerrilla style combat in the creative act.

And what I've seen is a mutation of this - people write articles to catch your attention, which is dangerous - honestly. Click bait is a word for a reason, the value should of getting attention should be there, but in it's current correct way that "real journalists" do it, we have a slew of content that is

1. Incorrect based of the title

2. Created a new phenom known as Headline Reading, where people literally read headlines instead of the article.

3. Made an impossible exponential task, journalism is now about topping the latest extreme thing, or at least that's what I've seen.

It's a race to the top of the charts, but at the expense of lowering our common humanity - and that ain't cool. Critics are terrible at this, instead of learning to critique better, they learn to critique more violently, and then this creates a completely pointless ecosystem where the loudest voices can be the most negative or extreme.

And who has the right to critique to the level Americans do anyways?

We live in a great country in the context of history and current geopolitical systems, we have nonstop access to warm food, free information, and constant opportunity to rise up, and even reform our systems to benefit those with power to act with virtue, and those without power to gain it with dignity and self-respect.

Yet, if you listen we always have 1,000 things to say, write, and tweet about everything - Obama, Trump, Hilary, McCain, Bush, Regan, Washington, King George - I honestly people - seek out conflict.

You're not going to create a better world by destroying the things you hate, you'll create a better world by fostering, nurturing, and growing the things you love. It's a fact.

One of the most common things I've noticed in my study of addiction is that the most sincere change is brought about when the values and lifestyle changes in the person, and the result is the stopping of the addiction, not the direct attack of the problem.

Anyways.

My perspective is that journalism is a very strange thing, it's a rigorous system, and is an institution that should have schooling, but it mainly needs to be utilized on an individual level.

It's the whole film school vs using your Iphone and learning by studying YouTube argument, both have their pros, but organic paths are better to me in the long run.

Think of it like this, I believe the fundamental Axiom of college is this:

Invest in yourself.

So that is the ideal system of any school, getting a degree can often signal you can (in hyper simple terms here) accomplish tasks in a given field, which makes you attractive to employers, and college is an investment.

However, with the Internet, with the Crypto, with this amazing and undeniably shift in humanity happening, the ability to invest in yourself is hugely different, but still essentially the same

Things change, often for the better, college and school no longer own the monopoly of education, they still have their stake, but the internet has made us all much more powerful than any of us could have ever imagined.

Here's my final thing, I agree with you, and I'd like to take it father - you could spend the next ten years trying to battle your way up entrenched and difficult publishers, and like most, tragically, end up writing in a style that is controversial, provocative, and well-written, and you will get promotions.

And you'll probably hate yourself, because your writing the game - the ecosystem - the rules. The rules that exist on the highest moral authority these is - Clickable Headlines. I am joking, obviously.

Or you could stick it out independently, get kicked around, and have a few eye rolls ("because thats not - ohmygawd legit) and then in the next 10 years, you could have a large following on Steemit, Instagram, and whatever the hell you want because this is your show, not the Rat Race Times one.

And that independence will be hyper valuable in 5 years, because guess what? When everyone and their mother knows about Steemit, and you can say your in the top 1,000 most followed writers, then it will have actual legitimacy. Then you having 30k and "Writer at X" will look stupid versus being to paid directly for your content, not so that Time can sell Watches and Cars to the middle class. (No offense middle class)

What I guess I am saying, is that - in the short term going independent is more risky, and people may roll their eyes, but if it works out, you'll be congratulated and respected - it's just the way most people are - they are afraid to try - because they know they can fail, and they are fearful to see you try.

And that's okay. When I tell people I made money trading stocks, they look at me different, than if I decided to tell them I was going to trade stocks, it's just the way it is - people react to the anxiety before hand, but often accept the victory if your good enough to pull it off.

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Also and to hell with this burying the lead concept. Do you want.

The best page of any story isn't the first one, if you want to grab peoples attention just say curse words - you should be striving to craft what you want to manifest, what art/story/whatever you want.

Harry Potter isn't good because of the first page, it's good because theirs something deeper throughout every word, sentence, and story within that.

Good luck on your future writing. Rarely do people find success without going off the beaten path. How else could it be?