WTF?
A flare for free labour
Major for-profit magazines started adopting the unsavoury practice of using unpaid editorial interns during the recession of the early ’90s. The appeal for the magazines was obvious: free labour. Bright-eyed young people were lured by the ostensible glamour of working for, say, Fashion or Saturday Night; three or six months later, they emerged, maybe having acquired some grounding in the mag biz, or maybe just having done a lot of photocopying and muffin-fetching.
The recession ended, but the exploitation has accelerated. It’s hard to find a masthead these days that doesn’t list a handful of interns. (Including, the sharp-eyed will note, This. Arguably, it’s hard to compare a Chatelaine, with annual revenues of $56 million, and a not-for-profit title where the two salaried employees earn less than the price of a big photo shoot.)
Fashion mag Flare recently ramped up the intern scam. Knocking off the I’m from Rolling Stone reality-show idea, it produced its own low-budget version. Applicants submitted 90-second clips touting themselves for the gig, which were then posted on the mag’s website, and readers were invited to vote for their fave. For the winner: three months at Flare and a $2,000 “bursary.” A set of rules longer than many pieces in the mag made clear “Prize does not include transportation and/or living expenses to, from or during the internship.” —Lynn Cunningham
