Do You Bill for Time You Spend Waiting for Clients?

www.inkthinkerblog.com — It seems we’re all so busy anymore that it’s hard for freelancers and their clients to keep appointments. Well, maybe just the freelancers and clients I deal with. :) But regardless, I’m wondering how you deal with it when you have a scheduled call with a client and they’re not available and the time you’ve arranged. For instance, they’re schedule a time to call you at 10 a.m. and you plan around it, and then you don’t hear from them.

It’s one thing to e-mail me 15 minutes before the call and say, “Can we make it 10:30 instead of 10?” because if I can, I will. And I get that stuff happens. But I never know what to do with existing, regular clients. Do you bill them for the time allotted for the call, or do you let it go since you just kept working on something else anyway?

I offer a free phone consultation for new clients, but if they bail on the first appointment, that uses up their free time and then they have to pay my hourly rate. How do you handle it for clients with whom you have an existing relationship?

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Is There a Glass Ceiling in Blogging?

www.inkthinkerblog.com — Interesting article in Sunday’s New York Times (via Debbi Mack), “Blogging’s Glass Ceiling,” about the BlogHer conference in San Francisco earlier this month. The article reads in part,

There is a measure of parity on the Web. According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project, among Internet users, 14 percent of men and 11 percent of women blog.

A study conducted by BlogHer and Compass Partners last year found that 36 million women participate in the blogosphere each week, and 15 million of them have their own blogs. (BlogHer, which was founded by Lisa Stone, Elisa Camahort Page and Jory Des Jardins, has itself grown into a mini empire that includes a Web site that helps publicize women’s blogs, and an advertising network to help women generate revenue for the site.)

Yet, when Techcult, a technology Web site, recently listed its top 100 Web celebrities, only 11 of them were women. Last year, Forbes.com ran a similar list, naming 4 women on its list of 25.

“It’s disheartening and frustrating,” said Allison Blass, a BlogHer attendee whose personal blog at www.lemonade-life.com is about living with Type 1 diabetes.

Interesting concept, this glass ceiling for women bloggers. I’ve never felt marginalized as a woman blogger, though as a non-mommyblogger… well, that’s another story, and one I’m still feeling kind of cranky about thanks to all of the people at BlogHer who looked at me like I had four heads when I told them I didn’t have kids.

What do you think? Is there a glass ceiling in blogging? What about in writing in general?

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Video: Finally Back in VA After BlogHer08

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Video: End of BlogHer08!

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The Preservative Value of the Internet Is Alive and Well

www.inkthinkerblog.com — One of the things that just blows me away about the Internet, and digital media in general, is that we no longer have to fret about manuscripts disintegrating and being lost for all time. The paper may still disintegrate, but we now have a means to preserve priceless intellectual content and works of immeasurable cultural value.

Case in point: I read today that sections of the Codex Sinaiticus, which is one of the oldest copies of the Bible in existence today, will be available online in high-resolution images beginning this week, and the whole thing is set to be published over the next 12 months. You can read all about it in today’s MSNBC article “1,600-year-old version of Bible goes online: Technology makes one of oldest cultural artifacts accessible to everyone.”

I was hoping for a cool video that would show us what the physical manuscript looks like, but all I found were scholars speaking German and Italian, and since I don’t speak either, I’m reluctant to post a video I can’t understand. But keep your eyes on www.codex-sinaiticus.net for the high-res images later this week. There are currently folios and screenshots available for download there, along with an announcement that the site will go live on July 24.

What amazes you about the Internet?

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