Life as an Internet Wrestling Journalist is Hard...Still!

The world if internet writing can be one of ups and downs, and in the past few weeks I've found that most of my 'net writing career has contained downs.

A few weeks ago, one of the site masters of PWC, Ken Matthews, asked me to become "exclusive" to PWC. I considered it, but decided against it, because I wanted to stay loyal to those editors and site masters who gave me a start in this business a year ago.

But recent events have made it feel like I am exclusive to PWC now.

Going through the list of editors I would send my work off to, I found that some of the web sites I wrote for hadn't been updated in ages, and some of the newsletters I wrote for hadn't had an issue out for ages. Then, I got a rather interesting, and somewhat saddening, e-mail and instant message from a fellow newsletter editor.

Mike Aldren, editor of Essential Wrestling News, got in touch with me and gave me the news - The Chokeslam Newsletter, from what I understand, the third largest newsletter on the net, was dead, and he asked me if I was interested in taking over the reigns.

This shocked me. TCN had a subscription list of about 5,000, and was regarded as one of the finest newsletters out there. Last December, when I reviewed several newsletters, I rated TCN as the best on the net.


What annoyed me at the time it seemed that the editors, Michael Van Der Hearst and J.W. Storm, would let TCN just slip away without a word. This reminded me of events earlier in the year, with the old Daily Smackdown newsletter. They had undergone a change of ownership, and their new editors, headed by one L.A. Navarro, just seemed to give up on it. DSD just vanished, and Navarro and his band of merry men couldn't even be bothered to let the writers know what was happening.

So, with the news that TCN was "dead", I emailed Michael and JW asking them if it was true they were looking for a new editor. I also asked them to do the decent thing - let the readers and the writers know what was happening. Given the number of subscribers they had, it was the least they could do.

To his credit, JW did this not long after I emailed him, and he brought good news with him as well - in his eyes, TCN was not dead, and would be returning mid-August. He then emailed me personally, asking if I would like to help out. I asked him what role he would have me do, but since then, I've heard nothing.

Michael finally sent out a farewell message a couple of days ago, thanking everyone for their support. He said that working for TCN at first was a pleasure, and now it seemed more like a job. Well, as a fellow newsletter editor, I could see his point.

So where does this leave my 'net writing career now? As it stands, this column will only be appearing in four places - the aforementioned www.prowrestlingcolumns.com, Jack Hensley's WWF: The Inside Source Newsletter (wwfheatitup-subscribe@topica.com), Adam Honey's 3:16 Report (subs316@yahoo.com), and my own Two Sheds Chronicles Newsletter (twoshedschronicles-subscribe@topica.com).

After a year of writing on the 'net, constantly being praised for my work, people coming at me from all corners wanting my work to appear on their sites and in their newsletters, I'm starting to feel a little disappointed. I'm now starting to look for more avenues, more outlets, more places where my work can be seen. I heard Mike Aldren was looking for more columnists, but his apparent "exclusives only" policy is a little off-putting. I even considered giving Shannon Rose of Pro Wrestling Daily a call. Shannon and I haven't seen eye to eye in the past, but he did offer me a spot a while back, which I had to turn down because, at the time, I thought I would be doing some work for WAW. Who knows, if that spot is still open....

So what have I learned in the past couple of weeks - that life as an 'net wrestling writer is just like real life - it has it good moments, but it also has it's down points. So, perhaps I should end by repeating the words of great British television character Yosser Hughes - "Go on. Giz a job."