Constant Content

I think there should be a way for writers to know how many articles have been submitted in response to a Public Request, especially when the requester only wants one article. I'm speaking about the number of people who have actually written an article and submitted it. Maybe there is some automatic way that once articles are submitted for a specific request, an indicator by the request lists the current amount of submissions. This idea of a multitude of authors all writing for a single request, with no knowledge of how many other writers are doing the exact same thing, doesn't seem the best way, especially if the requester's subject is unique and research has to be done. I agree with the idea of building a portfolio, but I think it's fairer to all the writers to know how many people have submitted for a given job, in case some of them deem it better just to focus on another request.

I am not up-to-date on how computers work, so I do not know how difficult it would be to implement your idea. I do like your idea but we do have to be fair to the customer and give him plenty of choices. I ofen do not write a public request article because I think I am too late and have too much competition. This is especially true if only 1 article is required. Maybe I am losing a sale. I am more inclined to write the article if I think I can sell it anyway. Sometimes you can put your article up for a public request article at whatever price is agreed and you can change the price later if you do not sell by public request. I have done this and ended up with a higher sale.

Some issues with this idea. A good number of the submissions are from newer members and they get rejected. This would throw off the count. Often buyers ask for one article but buy several. Many authors report that they sell articles written for a request later if not bought by the requester.

I've come to look at the public requests as indications of market demand. If it looks interesting to me I'll write it, but I'm not going to get upset if someone else (or no one else) sells to the requester. The alternative is to write to total spec.

One of CCs main selling points is that a buyer can put in a request and get lots of articles to pick from. Anything that will weaken that unique selling proposition is not good for us as writers.