The Business Of The News

The good.

Passion drives all
The news is a very passionate source of self expression. I started Wax Wing news utilizing my passion for writing and letting others. No strong editing, no filtering, no holding back. What I wanted was unadulterated passion, and I feel like I got that. Other news companies really have a subject they like, covering economy, politics, elections, history.

That wasn't enough for me
I wanted to do more, I wanted to see it all. Entertainment, economy, politics, elections, history, interviews. This has truly been one of the most fun yet draining experiences I ever had in my life. The people I meet are amazing and like-minded. Even the ones that vanish from DC. Even the ones that get fired or leave on their own accord. Every journalist or worker for Wax Wing News is someone I hold at least a little bit close to myself. It's the only thing that keeps me going, even through the bad and the ugly. It's those peoples passions, hobbies, the fun they have, meeting each-other and just making things. It's that, that brought me to DC in the first place.

The Bad

The struggles
Getting off the ground floor was the easiest part. Yet also the hardest thing I've had to do in Redmont. Starting up a DB and a discord, applying for the #news channel. that's the easy stuff. The real challenge comes in writing the right things, especially when you feel alienated from the server. When you take a large hiatus, all you know is what you knew back then. When you come back to DC it felt like it aged three hundred times as much as it did.

Having no stories is fine, not everybody has stories to tell or give. But when you have a passion to write on something... Anything... You just do it. I had a funny interaction with someone involving animals in an apartment in Oakridge being gunned down and them having a lazy excuse. It was bold, comedic. And it got removed by the staff from #news for quote "not being news." Do I have a grudge for this? Maybe, but it inspired me to hire my first few employees.

They weren't the best but I didn't have the money to pay them well anyway. So it was even. I hired information gatherers and one volunteer writer who stuck it out with us for a while. That's the upside of starting up came around. The nice people, the good people, the people who genuinely just want to make friends. Those are people I'll remember for a long time. However there was one singular truth that I can't ignore anymore. One that's faced me again and again and again.

The news industry belongs to the highest bidder.

In this case the highest bidders were companies larger than you could ever imagine. People with government affiliations or simply boatloads of cash. Throughout my entire journalism career they've been the biggest titans in news. Ones that no new news organization could even dare to compete with. They paid obscene amounts of money per article, never charged cash to see their work. To me it seemed that they simply could solve all their problems by having enormous amounts of cash. I had bills to pay, employees to pay direct cuts of my net worth. To this day it feels like a titan in the distance, one that takes a very tight hold on the news industry as a whole. Being an independent studio is way harder than you think it is.

The cash

I was in my second office I moved to because it was much more cheap to rent out than the first. I hired some employees that are still very close to me to this day. We made amazing things, golden articles, interviewing, drawing up content, hiring more and more journalists. Even with small amounts of cash bolstered by money making schemes to stay afloat, I was willing to look these titans in the industry in the face and say "I will use this fire in my soul to keep up, don't doubt on that." That's when I discovered the power of sponsors.

I'm a very interconnected guy, I know plenty of people, not that I'm popular I just happen to make friends pretty easily. Within that we got our first sponsor. A now shut down DC gambling website, despite my personal moral objections with gambling as a whole I took it because I wanted to one day be able to pay as much as those titans. To expand I needed money, so sponsors came. Through my connections I got my third office, a place we remain to this day. Now that I had no personal bills I began focusing on helping my employees, paying them by the job and paying their bills when the subjects came up.

As I grew more sponsors came up, more opportunities, new money making schemes, new mistakes, new flourishing's, new gifts. The news industry is an absolute mess to work in for new people. However, if you can stick it through, stick to your morals, your dignity, and the people around you. You can watch one of the most beautiful things in DC, you can truly be proud of yourself.

If you got an idea, just go for it, don't let other people pass you by. I've been considering starting up public speaking, connection making, and journalism classes. I'm no expert in any of these fields but I got a lot I could talk about, and it's never going to fit all into one article.

PS. don't be afraid to hire new players, they may just surprise you with just how good they can be.

(Written by Icarus_funni)