A poorly-written, too-long screed on The Atlantic trying to justify terrible business practices

Via Kara Swisher, this way-too-long rant in response to a journalist who was asked to work for free for The Atlantic.

While I don't have a zero-tolerance policy against working for free, I do believe that if you are asked to work for free doing what you do for a living you should be paid. I think there are some gray areas -- comedians tend to make their livings via live performances and recordings. If I ask some little-known comics to help build something cool, I may ask them to briefly work for sweat equity...

In fact, early in Weblogs, Inc. contributors DID work for free. When I started the pay was at $4 a post. Crazy, right? But we knew Jason and Brian were building something cool. So we invested with our time.

The Atlantic isn't doing that. The Atlantic is saying "our business sucks, so our solution is to pay shit." Well, considering the quality of that online editor's screed, you are getting exactly what you are (not) paying for, Atlantic.