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:

• Alberta Magazines Conference registration open [Canadian Magazines]
• Freelance Fundamentals: Media Journeys 2013 [Cool As Words] (via @luigibenetton)
• Your nominees for the J-Source Canadian Newsperson of the Year award [J-Source]
• On research, exposure and rates: The effect of paywalls on freelancers [J-Source]
• Zoomer magazine struts its style stuff [Masthead]
• As losses mount, Sun turns to CRTC [Globe & Mail]

 

From the U.S. and beyond:

• Top 3 Tips for Conducting Better Interviews [The Freelance Strategist] (via @LuigiBenetton)
• How To Crowdfund Your Journalism Project [Mediabistro]
• New Al Jazeera Network Staffing Up [Mediabistro]
• Are Interns the New Housewives? [Jezebel]
• Is the decline in longform newspaper journalism a good thing or a bad thing? [PaidContent]
• Stolen Video: Neil Lennon humiliates journalist in a nice way [The Score] (via @timfalconer)

 

From Story Board last week:

• 2013: The Year of the Freelancer?: Pointing at shifting employment trends that include an increasing use of independent contractors, the online employment platform Elance predicts that 2013 will be The Year of the Freelancer. We’re only a few weeks into the year, but already there’s been a lot of talk in the media about freelancing...
• How to be a Better (Food) Blogger: If you have a blog — or are thinking about starting one — there’s some valuable advice for you here. It’s a recording of a Google+ Hangout involving several established food writers that happened earlier this month. The hour and a half long discussion amounts to a free blog-writing workshop — and it’s not just advice for writers of the foodie variety. There’s a lot of general advice here that will be useful to bloggers of all kinds...