Once a week, we gather stories about the media business, journalism, writing, publishing, and freelancing—with a Canadian focus—and share them in Off the Wire. Who needs a water cooler?

From Canada:

• How My Business Ate My Money in 2015 [Rags 2 Reasonable]
• The freedom of freelancing (and other ironies) [Editors Toronto Blog]
• The union you make for the VICE you want [CMG]

 

From The U.S. and beyond:

• Twitter unveils revised rules regarding hate speech in posts [The Guardian]
• 69 Journalists Killed in 2015 [CPJ]
• How to follow-up without being creepy [Freelancers Union]
• How to Be More Productive: 21 Ways to Start the New Year Right [The Write Life]
• How to create a simple 2-page business plan [Freelancers Union]
• 10 (Serious) Tips for Surviving the Freelance Holiday Slump [The Freelancer]

 

Last week on Story Board:

• The Internet ate my homework (Or: How to save your published web work): When you were a kid in grade school you probably became familiar with the worst excuse ever for losing your homework: the dog ate it. These days, it’s probably not the dog you need to look out for. At some point you’ll likely fall prey to gobbling up of another sort – the swallowing of Internet content, leaving you with a link that takes you to an empty page or error message...

Spot a story you think we should include in next week's Off the Wire? Email the link to editor@thestoryboard.ca or tweet us at @storyboard_ca.