Hi all,

For a number of years now (since 2007) I've been writing for media blogs. Mostly gaming/horror/music sites. Video games were by far the most successful, and I have established (in my opinion) a fairly strong body of work. I've penned some popular content and interviewed many well known names in the industry.

However, I have always worked pro bono for "enthusiast sites". Essentially, I was at a level where I was getting press badges for events like PAX, ComicCon and E3, standing alongside folks being paid for their work (IGN, Gamespot, Joystiq, etc) but my compensation was limited to review copies of games, and the "experience" of attending events as press for free. Meanwhile, I'm sure I was lining someone else's pockets by creating content for their sites.

I know this is quite a specific situation, so I'm curious if anyone has been in a similar boat and can share advice or experience on how to make the jump to actually being paid for this work as a freelancer. Are their any specific strategies to begin getting paid as a contributor for online media outlets?

tl;dr : I believe I may have been devaluing my own work for almost a decade. How do I start asking to be paid for my writing efforts?