Devon Maloney
Devon Maloney is a journalist, editor, and critic exploring how pop culture shapes and is shaped by our everyday lives. One time the internet culture editor at The Verge, her work has also appeared in WIRED, Vanity Fair, Cosmopolitan, Playboy, Pitchfork, Out, Grantland, and VICE, as well as many other places. You can follow her on Twitter.
Tell us about your early days as a writer. What was your first paid writing gig, and how did you land it? What did you learn from that first experience?
In college, I landed a reported feature at Boston's Weekly Dig. I *thought* I was going to be paid — it was a piece about how easy it was for American Apparel employees to steal large quantities of merchandise from their stores, and I'd gotten a number of current and former employees to talk to me about their five-finger discounts — but after the editor accepted the piece and ran it he said that "because I'd written it for a class," he couldn't (or wouldn't) pay me for it.
I didn't use what I'd learned for a couple years, but the lesson was very clear: always, ALWAYS negotiate a rate before you send a draft! (The universe ended up paying me back, though — that editor tried to pitch me a couple stories when I graduated and got a full-time job. Ignoring his emails felt *amazing*.)
What's your day-to-day writing life these days working as internet culture editor at The Verge?
Most of the writing I do at The Verge can be described as quick news hits, dumb internet ephemera that I can do quickly, or just straight-up rewriting bits of drafts filed to me.
Once in a while, I get the chance to do a bigger reported feature — like this summer I wrote a big piece about Wakandacon — but the reality of being an editor is that you have to be fully there for your writers, and siloing yourself off to write naturally takes away from that. :(
What's something people often get wrong about the work you do?
Maybe the idea that it takes some sort of unattainable talent to do what I do? I've been out at social functions and had people marvel at how good I am at what I do, and I'm super flattered by that, but honestly, the bulk of what I do is repetitive and toxic.
You have to be willing to work at your voice and get better at organizing your thoughts, and you have to be passionate about doing it. But the magical part is when people — when YOU — actually like what I've written and put out into the world? That's what's crazy to me. Whatever I'm doing is smoke and mirrors over here. If anything I'd prefer to be recognized for surviving this industry every day!
Favorite piece you've written in the past year? What made it stand out?
I wrote this essay about modern love and that Black Mirror episode "Hang the DJ" for WIRED back in December 2017. Any day I get to write about dystopian fiction is a great day, obviously — I've been doing it for years now — but I'm usually very uncomfortable writing about my romantic life, let alone being vulnerable about how hard and lonely it can be, so I was really proud of myself for doing this and doing it as well as (I think) I did!
You are super active on Twitter--is it purely a social outlet for you, or does it have an impact on your writing career? Or both?
That's a tricky question! While I was a freelancer, those two things were one and the same — when you work for yourself, you have to remind clients, and by extension other people in your field, that you exist. Twitter is great for that. I've met soooo many editors and fellow freelancers there — some of whom have become some of my best friends IRL.
Now it's more tool than anything, though — as an internet culture editor I need to keep up with what's going down on all the big platforms, and being there makes it easier for me to follow writers I might want to commission and sources I might want to get in touch with (for example, I just met Jen Takahashi of @bestofnextdoor via Twitter DM).
I think one reason writers love it so much, also, is because it's like improv for us — a way to exercise creativity and ideas in a public forum before committing to more serious publication. All that said — I fantasize about the day I'm able to delete my account for good. It's toxic and exhausting abyss I'll be glad to be rid of
Um, the Rock tweeted at you and said nice things. Let's not forget to mention that.
In fairness, the Rock tweets at plenty of people, but yes, it ruled! I have actually put that on my resumé; I've even dropped it into a dating profile or two.
If you had to give writers today one piece of advice, what would it be?
Pure writing advice: know where you're going with a piece before you start in on it. I've said this a lot about television, that my favorite kinds of shows are the ones where the showrunner knows how the show is going to end from the jump, but it applies to writing, too.
Give yourself a framework — doesn't have to look like anyone else's, but it has to have an internal logic and rules that your reader can follow. It builds trust, and there's nothing more important.
