A tech conference speaker and MC reflects on encouraging attendees at events like SmashingConf Freiburg and CSS Day to approach and talk with speakers, describing efforts to physically connect shy attendees with speakers at after-parties and dinners. The author notes that the informal feedback speakers once got via Twitter has largely disappeared, leaving many without direct affirmation of their talks.
Stephanie Yuhas, an award-winning TV and film writer and producer, launched a pet-sitting side business called The Funny Sitter after industry disruptions from the pandemic, writers' strikes, and a personal divorce upended her entertainment career. The business grew through word-of-mouth referrals, and she eventually hired trusted staff to help expand operations. It now brings in about $5,000 monthly on average, with earnings surging to roughly $15,000 during the holiday season.
A literary essay examines how Edgar Allan Poe's stories derive their terror not from the murders depicted but from the confessions that follow them, tracing this back to Poe's own career struggles as an editor at Graham's magazine in 1841 Philadelphia. It details Poe's financial precariousness as a writer, noting he earned little from his early books despite growing critical respect, and had to rely on magazine work to make a living.