VO-BB - 19 YEARS OLD!

[BBeen]

I might be able to afford that brand new shirt from Wal-mart I've been wanting for sooo long now!!







$6-$10 per recorded article

Description Background

NewsworthyAudio is launching a personalized audio news service for news-hungry, busy adults, providing participating voice talent with a recurring predictable project/revenue stream. The service consists of hundreds of news articles from leading newspapers recorded in audio format on a daily basis for consumers to listening to on their PC, MP3 player, or car stereo.

For the purposes of an initial test pilot, a more limited set of recorded articles in audio format will be available to participants each day for 5 to 10 days during the month of May. The content will consist primarily of newspaper articles, roughly 1000 words in length, per the following schedule:

• Afternoon commute playlist:

o 10 standard newspaper articles will be selected each day and forwarded to voice talent by 2:00 PM EST

o Voice talent will record articles and upload them to the company by 4:00 PM EST.

• Morning commute playlist:

o 10 standard newspaper articles will be selected each day and forwarded to voice talent by 10:00 PM EST.

o Voice talent will record articles and upload them to the company by 4:00 AM EST.

Project

Record and forward a minimum of 2 and a maximum of 20 newspaper articles per day (roughly 1000 words in length) per the schedule above. NewsworthyAudio proposes paying voice talent on a per article basis and needs to keep these costs low with the understating that: 1) the recordings have a limited shelf life (less than 24 hours in most cases), 2) this is a new business model, and 3) the business and its systems are being developed to support the recording of periodical audio content on a massive scale, providing participating voice talent with a predictable daily project/revenue stream.

Please email –

• The number of 1000 word articles you are able to record and forward from 2:00 PM EST to 4:00 PM EST (2 hour window) Monday through Friday.

• The number of 1000 word articles you are able to record and forward from 10:00 PM EST to 4:00 AM EST (6 hour window) Sunday through Thursday.

• Cost for each 1000 word article recorded and forwarded, including cost rationale (ideally looking to come in at $6-$10 per recorded article) to support this new/unique business model.

• Please provide one of your standard demos.

Thank you. I sincerely appreciate your time, interest, and consideration of this exciting project.

[SoundsGreat-Elaine Singer]

My premium subscription to voice123 recently expired and I didn't renew. I wrote to them explaining why and one of the reasons I mentioned was:



1. The ridiculously low prices offered for work and the lack of guidance for both job posters and job seekers on what is reasonable for voiceover work.



This was their reply:



"Thank you for your feedback, we really appreciate it. To respond to your queries, we have a lead approval process, that doesn't allow leads that have too low a budget. Talents set their own prices and it is down to you to negotiate with clients. We are constantly trying to improve the quality of our leads and are doing a lot of marketing to achieve this."



When I saw the above lead this morning, I had to laugh. Some "lead approval process"!
_________________
Elaine
The Youthful Mature Voice (Emeritus)
Senectitude is not for the faint of heart.

[Andy]

Yes, Bud it's ridiculous. Welcome to Voice123. Always the outspoken one, I sent them a reply thanking them for contributing to the bottom feeder mentality of Internet, virtual auditioning and asked if they even had copyright approval to "lift" items from other media. My Associated Press subscription runs around $2,000 a month. And it's even more if I post AP material to my station's web site...which I don't. Soooo, one should be very cautious of that lead.



"Sometimes ya just gotta say, WTF."

[Charlie Channel]

[SoundsGreat-Elaine Singer]

So if I understand this correctly, you're saying that if I read something 'in good faith' and it turns out there is a copyright infringement, I would be liable as well as the original infringer?



What about an instance where I do a dry read and they add copyrighted material after the fact. Would I still be liable?
_________________
Elaine
The Youthful Mature Voice (Emeritus)
Senectitude is not for the faint of heart.

[Bill]

WTF is right...gotta wonder about some people's "business model"



News for busy adults? Let's see I could spend time downloading audio from the internet, moving it to my mp3 player, take it to my car, plug it into the stereo, and get news that is a few hours old, or.... or or.. oooohhh, I could just flip on the radio?

(hmmmm, or even better, hit CNN.com or one of the other sites and read it for myself...)



I sincerely doubt they would have a renewable revenue stream for VO talent, predictable maybe... that it will never get off the ground.



Just my buck 380, and as always, I reserve the right to be wrong.

[kgenus]

I didn't renew for the same reasons. My first job from v123 was $50, the second, $1000. After that, I stopped using it.
_________________
Genus

[Andy]

[Spacegypsy]

I saw that voice123 post at $6-10 per article (eesh!) and after seeing the posts here I went back (to the deleted leads section) to see how many talents actually responded to this - it was 145!

I can't believe that folks would even consider this, I am stumped.

[SoundsGreat-Elaine Singer]

I wrote them again citing this as the perfect example of the ridiculously low fees being offered on their site and got this reply:



Dear Elaine,



This lead was approved because of the quantity of work involved.



They really don't get it, do they.
_________________
Elaine
The Youthful Mature Voice (Emeritus)
Senectitude is not for the faint of heart.

[BBeen]

Do the math on this one, although I think at this point it may be redundant. One article at a maximum of 10$ for said article, guestimating an average of 5-10 minutes of recorded audio for each article. I may be a beginner hungry for work, but I can almost make that much money working for Mickey D's flipping burgers. Hmmmmm maybe I'll buy socks to go with that new shirt.....

[Andy]

Oh, they get it. Thing is, it ain't about putting our best interests first. "Let talents compete for the job!" That's the sell line right on the home page. Their business model is to get as many VO's as possible to pony up the $200 to join the service. They don't care if a lot of 'em are simply plugging a $10 Wal-Mart mic into the back of their computers.





Those of us who have some savvy about what we're doing, know the lead posted above is frought with issues. On the surface, if ya do the numbers at 20 scripts a day at $10 per script, a VO could gross over $50K a year. But, damn, that's a lot of copy puking five days a week. Plus, you're chained to your studio at some really odd hours. Then, there's the copyright issue. In addition, is this company truly legitimate? Or, are they a couple of bozos who happened to come up with this idea over a bucket brews and wings at Hooters? Ya just don't know. And that's the risk of playin' the Internet for gigs.



Still, it might be the right fit for some out of work jock, or news person who suddenly found themselves "Clear Channeled."



In the end, it's as simple as saying to yourself, "Well, this lead is bullshit. Pass."