The Portal

For some reason, I had in my mind that blogging was a little like ReTweeting — in that, if you posted links back to the original post, you could recycle others’ content and help the original author extend their reach. It’s also (or can be) a lazy way of generating material but I somehow thought, with full transparancy, it was an acceptable practice when not overused.

My first mistake was in missing the distinction between individually-authored blogs and those created by for-profit entities. The second was not asking the post’s original author or publisher for permission to reprint — which, of course, I now realize is an essential courtesy. I “borrowed” something that was not mine to take. Said publisher in this case, EnvatoNetwork contacted me and pointed out these missteps in a very gracious way. I am grateful for the education and share my “lesson learned” with all the rest of you here.

Envato Network offers a full product line of blogs, themes, tutorials, and other resources that I am certain to revisit. Among them, to a self-employed contractor, FreelanceSwitch offers exceptional value. Please note these guys aren’t just in it for the money — they recently promoted a Freelance Camp here in Houston and I assume other events with some regularity.

My original blog post was titled Top 10 Myths About Freelancers: Shamelessly Re-Cycled. Chagrined but unbowed, and no longer recycling, I commend it to you here:  author Adrian Try, a noted open-source software proponent, offers Top 10 Myths About Freelancers, with a number of collateral links (and counter-arguments) relating to each entry.

• freelancers spend the day on non-work-related activities

• freelancers don’t have the resources of large companies

• freelancers don’t have the leverage of a large company

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