Introducing the VGHF Writing Fund!

When we launched the Video Game History Foundation back in February, our goal was to make sure that researchers had access to the materials they would need to tell the stories of our past.

We believe that given the right tools, we can not only reconstruct history that might otherwise be lost, but gain new insights into how and why we play games today. Now we want to prove that concept out by actually funding these stories.

Thanks to recent donations, we’re happy to announce The Video Game History Foundation Writing Fund. This initiative will pay creators to produce editorial content on GameHistory.org (as well as our Patreon and beyond) that utilizes not just the material from our collections, but our connections and expertise. In short: we want to pay people just like you to write cool articles about the history of video games!

We’re currently entertaining pitches and hoping to meet writers who have a passion for digging through vintage material and unearthing buried treasure. You’ll be working directly with an experienced and impassioned editor and historian (namely, myself, Frank Cifaldi), who is available not only to help you shape your story, but to dig out any materials we may have access to that will help flesh it out.

We’re open to all kinds of approaches to telling these stories (longer, in-depth work, shorter regular columns, possibly even audio and video), but we do ask the following:

• These stories must utilize period sources – meaning, vintage material like magazines from our library, electronic news databases, etc, as well as first-person interviews where appropriate. We are trying to show the world what can be accomplished if we go beyond what one can typically (or at least, easily) find through a Google search. Don’t worry, we’ll help you find these!
• Authors own their stories and are free to republish them elsewhere, so long as it is made clear that it was made possible through funding from The Video Game History Foundation, with a link back to the original article on GameHistory.org (or a text URL, if in print). We also ask that you allow us to do the same.

If this is something you’re interested in, send us an introduction along with story ideas and links to published works that best represent the kind of work you’d like to do to editor@gamehistory.org.

Pitch us on whatever story you’re passionate about researching and telling, but keep in mind that what we value are stories and subjects that are slightly off the beaten path. This is a rare opportunity to get paid to write articles that might be a tough sell on for-profit websites – please take advantage of it!