Against my better judgment I am writing this article for free. I am not alone. Thousands of people do this every day, perhaps even millions. Without our free voices the web would be a much lonelier place to visit. Collectively we sit at home, the office, or perhaps on a bus or train and write in our two cents about any and every topic one can imagine. Websites everywhere including, CNN, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and countless others all make space on their sites for end users and readers to contribute back and say what is on their mind.

Often times an article which was written by someone who actually got paid will be written in a dry voice and the comments left by users in response to it will be far more interesting. Both my father and I read and email articles back and forth to each other through out each week and many times we make notes to read certain comments.

I feel this free reporting by end users is both a good and a bad idea. While I am compelled myself to write responses, reviews, and small articles for free I still think it goes against the grain of how commerce in this society works, or should work under the best of circumstances.

As it stands now most sites require that comments be on topic and that users refrain from hurtful or negative reporting. Many sites have built in filters that will detect curse words or certain statements like "you idi*t!" and keep such content from hitting the web. Still, people are creative and many manage to stab and jab at other comments they do not like and creatively destroy other users with witty responses. I must admit this can be very entertaining to read. I myself have engaged in "response wars" on my Amazon.com reviews. Sometimes an article or review I have written causes another reader to respond angrily. This will then set me off and I will write, to the best of my ability, a carefully worded response to rebut what ever has been written. Other users will chime in and all the wile we are writing for free and traffic is being driven to these sites.

Much of this new traffic is being driven by the end users desire for their 15 minutes of fame. With the web as it stands now each and every one of us can have way more than 15 minutes. If you are witty, can write in your native language fairly well, and have something interesting to say you can be assured that many people will read what you have written. The responses people leave to my free articles can be a thrill to read. Just the other day I posted a picture I took to the New York Times website that was picked up by them and posted on their user photos of the recession section. It even appeared on the home page at some point. My text was credited as was my picture but I was not paid. The New York Times got my great shot and nicely written text blurb for free. What is up with that?

Sure we all know that the news industry is struggling. News papers are going out of business and ad revenues are dropping like flies. Meanwhile all these news organizations are picking up content that is driving traffic to their sites for free.  Sure the services of allowing users to write and comment is what is driving some of the initial traffic but it becomes cyclical and eventually with a well established section of a major website like CNNs iReport much traffic is driven by the users. And we do this all for free.

I have written   only 4 articles for iReport so far, (this one not included)  and they have been read a total of 4,464 times. I  find this amazing that little old me sitting here in my kitchen while I tend to the needs of my 2 year old son can write articles that can be read thousands of times. One review I wrote for Amazon.com on the fantastical fantasy film 300 generated several hundred responses.

My reviews on amazon.com have generated so many useful votes that Amazon invited me to participate in their Amazon.com Vine program. Now I am offered free stuff, mostly things I do not want or need, and am expected to write reviews for these items I receive. While this is closer to making money, getting lotion, berry juice, and a fondue dipper does not pay my bills or help me save for my kids college education.

Ultimately I hope to continue in this nether world of blogging for free and someday land freelance work or something that resembles getting actual money for writing.

As i sit here writing this my younger son is smiling at me eating a waffle, my wife has just made the coffee, my older son is just getting up with a nosebleed, Carol Costello is on CNN looking pretty and reporting the news, and I am none the richer for my writing efforts.

While all of us stopping dead in our tracks and not writing another single sentence unless we get paid is unrealistic, I would still like everyone to consider just what we are doing for these news organizations. Our efforts may be inadvertently hurting real ink and paper periodicals. We are also most certainly helping organizations like CNN.

Perhaps a small amount of money could be offered  for the best articles. This could up the ante and generate more well written and well though out articles and help cull the garbage. Of course the garbage could wind up winning any contest. That would be funny. In the end we should all consider that we should be compensated for our words. No matter how well or poorly written they may be, they are driving web traffic and we need to be compensated in some way, even if only with virtual web peanuts.